President’s signature to end illegal immigration at the border illustration by Greg Groesch / The Washington TimesThe White House is once again engaging in acts of political theater in order to avoid doing anything to secure our nation’s southern border. Recently, the New York Post, Reuters and Axios all ran articles stating that the Biden administration is examining whether or not the president has the power to close the border to foreign asylum-seekers.
Moreover, as a sovereign nation, the United States is under no obligation to admit foreign nationals for any reason. The Supreme Court has expressly affirmed this in at least two decisions. Finally, neither the Immigration and Nationality Act nor any other provision of U.S. domestic law imposes any obligation on the United States to let asylum-seekers in. In fact, asylum is a discretionary form of relief. What does that mean? Even if an individual is permitted to file for asylum and succeeds in establishing that he or she has been a victim of persecution, granting asylum is not obligatory if such a grant is not in the best interests of the United States.
In fact, according to the Congressional Research Service, every president since 1981 has invoked § 1182 to exclude one or more broad classes of aliens when their admission was not in the best of the United States. Between Dec. 31, 1980, and Feb. 15, 2024, that resulted in no fewer than 90 separate proclamations imposing restrictions upon or suspending the entry of foreign nationals.