As COVID border restrictions end, questions about impact on Arizona remain

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

57% : One little girl tucked in close to her mother as a U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer and a security guard smiled with the crowd before marching them south across the line.
57% : Troy Miller, the acting commissioner for CBP, said earlier this year, the U.S. announced "parole processes" for people from Venezuela, Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua, allowing people safe and orderly pathways to access the United States" while imposing consequences "for those who do not use them."
55% : Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said Wednesday that the Biden administration was "focused on solutions and have a robust plan to humanely manage the border through deterrence, enforcement, and diplomacy."
50% : Over the last week, Homeland Security officials have unveiled a brace of measures intended to mitigate the number of people, including a new "transit ban," a parole process for migrants to come into the U.S. temporarily as their asylum case moves through the court, and new "legal pathways" including "regional processing centers," and expanded use of a phone application known as CBP One for asylum seekers.
50% : Meanwhile, thousands of other migrants waited in northern Mexico for months for a chance to seek asylum until earlier this year.
49% : "This is not sustainable long-term and capacity will be exceeded at the community level without federal intervention," said the office of the mayor of the border city of Douglas.
49% :The new parole policy, agency officials wrote, "can only be used in certain exigent circumstances, such as where U.S. Border Patrol has apprehended over 7,000 non-citizens per day across the southwest border over a 72-hour period, or where the average time in custody has exceeded 60 hours."
49% : Without Parole with Conditions, the agency said Border Patrol would have over 45,000 people in custody by the end of the month.
48% : Moody demanded a halt to the process, arguing the use of parole violated a court order from a 2021 lawsuit over the use of prosecutorial discretion -- a long-held process that allows immigration officials to focus enforcement efforts on particular people, and is routinely used by law enforcement.
47% : CBP later paid $3.8 million in civil fees and was blocked from holding people for more than 48 hours without access to beds, blankets, a shower, and food that meets acceptable dietary standards.
47% : People can seek asylum through the CBP One, a smartphone application that allow migrants to set up an appointment at a U.S. port, and some migrants can seek asylum at newly-established regional centers, however, advocates called these systems flawed.
46% : "The court fails to see a material difference between what CBP will be doing under the challenged policy and what it claims that it would have to do if the policy was enjoined, because in both instances, aliens are being released into the country on an expedited basis without being placed in removal proceedings and with little to no vetting and no monitoring," he wrote.
46% : "This rule is cruel, punitive, and effectively ends asylum for the majority of the people we serve," said Laura St. John, Florence Project Legal Director.
41% : Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union, backed by the ACLU of Northern California, the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies and National Immigrant Justice Center, challenged the Biden administration's new policy -- which slid into place as Title 42 was lifted -- which blocks many migrants from getting asylum if they have traveled through other countries without seeking protection before coming to the U.S.-Mexico border.
41% :The ACLU wrote that U.S. law does not allow the administration to restrict access based on manner of entry, or whether someone applied for asylum elsewhere.
39% : Individuals should not put their lives in the hand of smugglers, only to face steep consequences, including at least a five-year bar on reentry and potential criminal prosecution for repeated attempts to enter unlawfully, and be sent back."
39% : Further, the ACLU wrote migrants cannot "meaningfully seek asylum in transit countries" because many "lack a functioning asylum system, others have systems that are stretched to the breaking point, and most are not remotely safe for asylum seekers to find refuge."
36% : ""Starting tonight, people who arrive at the border without a lawful pathway will be presumed ineligible for asylum," Mayorkas said, adding there were 24,000 border officials on the border, and DHS "surged" troops and contractors, as well as over 1,000 asylum officers to "help enforce our laws.""The border is not open," he said.
35% : While the court blocked the use of prosecutorial discretion, Moody accused Homeland Security officials -- who oversee CBP -- of restarting the "mass release of migrants" on the border as Title 42 was lifted after a DHS spokesperson said the agency plans to use the "targeted use of parole" to allow Border Patrol to "focus its resources most effectively" on quickly removing people who do not have a legal basis to remain in the country.""In short, rather than seek a stay of the court's judgment in good faith, the Biden administration plans to continue its game of whack-a-mole with Florida and with this court by promulgating yet another unlawful policy," Moody argued.
35% : "In addition to narrowing the pathway for accessing asylum to a largely inaccessible and discriminatory app, the rule implements extremely punitive consequences for people who enter between ports of entry, something that even a cruel expulsion policy like Title 42 didn't do.
31% : Biden administration lifts public health emergency, ending Title 42 enforcement

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