Not One More Day 

Of waiting to seek protection. 

What We Stand For

Our action is rooted in the values of 'civil initiative,' a term coined during the Sanctuary Movement, and our responsibility as civil society to recognize and publicly condemn the US government’s violation of international law as well as the 1980 Refugee Act. A complementary aspect of this public condemnation is lifting up the testimonies of asylum seekers and acknowledging the injustices that they have faced not only in their home country, but also in a country that had vowed to receive and protect them.

The Attack on Asylum

​The Trump Administration has worked to systematically limit access to asylum at the border. When Customs and Border Protection (CBP) implemented metering in May 2018 at the ports of entry in Nogales, migrants were abruptly faced with weeks and later months-long waits before being able to formally begin their asylum process in the U.S. This dynamic was exacerbated with the subsequent implementation of Migration Protection Protocol (MPP), otherwise known as “Remain in Mexico,” forcing asylum seekers to wait months or years in Mexico for their U.S. asylum hearings. These policies have obligated many of the migrants passing through Nogales to live in unsustainable uncertainty. Now the Administration has used the global pandemic as a pretext to fully suspend asylum processing, denying migrants fleeing persecution their right to refuge and due process in the United States.
 
Many asylum seekers currently in Nogales, Sonora have been waiting now for over a year to begin the process of seeking protection in the US. The hundreds of asylum seekers returned to Nogales under 'Remain in Mexico' have had their very first court dates rescheduled for spring and summer of 2021 with no guarantee that court will even be open by that date. Yet CBP continues to place newly arriving Cubans and Venezuelans under 'Remain in Mexico' and returning them to prolonged limbo in Nogales, Sonora, even as they subject asylum seekers from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador to expulsions with no consideration of their claims for protection.

President-elect Biden has publicly stated, both during his election and following his victory, that he plans to reverse the inhumane policies along the Southern US border, such as 'Remain in Mexico'/MPP and metering lists, but has yet to provide a timeline in which he plans to do. Now, looking forward to a Biden-Harris Administration with hope and rejuvenation, we continue in our fight to SaveAsylum and call on the incoming administration to follow through with their campaign promises to restore the dismantled asylum process. 

Supporting Organizations