President Donald Trump wants to restrict migrants from seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border. A judge has temporarily halted that plan. | John Moore/Getty Images) EMPLOYMENT & IMMIGRATION Federal judge halts Trump asylum ban

A federal judge in San Francisco late Monday temporarily halted President Donald Trump's move to restrict asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border, dealing another blow to the administration’s immigration agenda.

Judge Jon Tigar's ruling suspends implementation of a fast-track regulation and presidential proclamation issued Nov. 9 that barred migrants who cross the border between ports of entry from seeking asylum. The order will remain in effect until Dec. 19, when the court will consider arguments for a permanent ban.


The Justice Department didn’t immediately say whether it plans to appeal the ruling, though it has challenged similar orders in the past.

The ruling comes as multiple caravans of Central American migrants are massing in Tijuana, an official port of entry. On Monday, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen tweeted that a migrant caravan planned to rush the border checkpoint, though officials later questioned the seriousness of the threat.

"Whatever the scope of the president's authority, he may not rewrite the immigration laws to impose a condition that Congress has expressly forbidden," Tigar wrote in his opinion. "Asylum seekers will be put at increased risk of violence and other harms at the border, and many will be deprived of meritorious asylum claims."

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Trump made the migrant caravans a central focus in the days leading up to the Nov. 6 election, tweeting frequently about them and announcing at the end of October that he would deploy additional troops to the border. He said little about the caravans in the immediate aftermath of the election but recently resumed tweeting about them.

"The Mayor of Tijuana, Mexico, just stated that 'the City is ill-prepared to handle this many migrants, the backlog could last 6 months,'" the president wrote Sunday. "Likewise, the U.S. is ill-prepared for this invasion, and will not stand for it. They are causing crime and big problems in Mexico. Go home!"

Still, military officials said Monday they would begin withdrawing the 5,800 troops that had been deployed to the border. Trump's decision to send them earned criticism from members of both parties, who described it as a pre-election gambit.

The general overseeing the deployment told POLITICO some of the troops are already unneeded, having completed the missions for which they were sent.

In the asylum ban case, East Bay Sanctuary Covenant v. Trump, the American Civil Liberties Union, which brought the lawsuit on behalf of several nonprofits, argued that the presidential actions contradicted statutory language that allows migrants to apply for asylum "whether or not at a designated port of arrival."

“The president cannot simply discard federal statutes,“ said Lee Gelernt, the ACLU attorney who argued the case. “Without judicial intervention, migrants would have been in immediate danger.”

The ACLU also argued that, in fast-tracking the rule, the Trump administration flouted its legal requirement under the Administrative Procedures Act to solicit public feedback.

The Trump administration answered that it had the authority to impose additional restrictions on asylum because it's a “discretionary immigration benefit.”

“The rule and proclamation aim to save lives by discouraging asylum seekers from making dangerous, unlawful border crossings,” the Justice Department wrote in its response to the complaint.

But the court found that the administration’s actions were an attempt to rewrite immigration law, which explicitly states that migrants may seek asylum whether or not they arrive at a designated port of entry.

“Congress,” Tigar wrote, “has clearly commanded that immigrants be eligible for asylum regardless of where they enter.“

Wesley Morgan contributed to this report.