New Senate Proposal Would Eviscerate Asylum Protections

WASHINGTON — Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has put forth a hard-line immigration proposal in exchange for reopening the government, which has been shut down since December — the longest in U.S. history.

Lorella Praeli, deputy political director at the American Civil Liberties Union, had the following response:

“This proposal is substantially worse than what the president described in his speech — and that was already a non-starter.

“In addition to providing $5.7 billion for a border wall and record funding to jail an unprecedented 52,000 immigrants per day, it includes Stephen Miller’s wish list of anti-immigrant provisions. This sham ‘compromise’ would weaken the asylum system, strip vulnerable children of critical safeguards in the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, and hollow out protections for individuals from countries ravaged by natural disasters or war. Even the so-called ‘protections’ for DACA and TPS recipients are hollow, as those communities have only been forced to wait for a permanent solution because President Trump ended the programs.

“President Trump continues to extort American workers in his ill-advised fight for an ineffective and harmful border wall. Congress must reject this proposal, and instead pass one of the several bills that fund our government without holding immigrants and Americans hostage.”