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The regulation would require migrants to be assessed at an
initial asylum screening stage to see whether they should be
barred from asylum and quickly deported, said the sources, who
requested anonymity to discuss internal government planning.
They added that the measure appeared limited in scope.
The migrants would be assessed for asylum bars related to
criminality and security threats, two of the sources said.
The new regulation would improve efficiency by screening asylum
seekers earlier in the process to determine whether they should
be barred, one of the sources, a U.S. official, told Reuters. It
would be issued as a proposed regulation and finalized at a
later date, the official said.
U.S. President Joe Biden, a Democrat seeking another four-year
term in the Nov. 5 election, has struggled with record numbers
of migrants caught crossing the U.S.-Mexico border since taking
office in 2021. Former President Donald Trump, Biden's
Republican challenger, has criticized Biden for rolling back
more restrictive Trump-era policies.
The Biden administration has considered a more sweeping move to
block asylum seekers and migrants at the border using a federal
statute deployed by Trump in his travel bans, but is not
immediately planning to take that step, the sources said.
Biden implemented new asylum restrictions last year, but their
effectiveness has been limited by a lack of resources to process
arriving migrants.
The regulation expected to be issued this week could potentially
mean thousands of people would be more quickly deported from the
U.S. per year, two of the sources said, a relatively small
number compared with the total number caught crossing illegally.
(Reporting by Ted Hesson in Washington; Editing by Mica
Rosenberg and Jonathan Oatis)
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