A federal judge has temporarily blocked the Biden administration from ending a Trump-era policy requiring asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico for hearings in U.S. immigration court.
The judge in Texas on Thursday stayed the termination until legal challenges by Texas and Missouri are settled but didn’t order the policy reinstated and the impact on the program wasn’t immediately clear.
Under President Donald Trump, about 70,000 asylum-seekers were forced to wait in Mexico for U.S. hearings under the policy introduced in January 2019, which President Joe Biden suspended on his first day in office.
The same judge ordered it reinstated last year but the U.S. Supreme Court overturned that ruling and sent the policy back for reconsideration.