Joe Biden's administration will announce on Thursday that it is to restart Donald Trump's controversial Remain in Mexico asylum policy, according to a report.
Biden, on taking the White House, immediately ended the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), as the policy is formally known.
His predecessor had implemented the scheme in January 2019, and it faced multiple legal challenges from critics who said that turning asylum seekers away breached international law.
Yet supporters of the policy argued that it was a sensible way to deal with those waiting to have their cases heard in overwhelmed U.S. immigration courts, and admitted that it also served as a deterrence.
When Biden assumed office, migrant numbers surged, with many openly stating that they were now attempting to enter the U.S. illegally because they felt the new president would be more sympathetic than Trump.
Joe Biden, seen on December 1, will announce the resumption of the Remain in Mexico policy on Thursday, according to The Washington Post
Under Donald Trump, from January 2019 to January 2020 approximately 60,000 migrants were forced to wait in Mexico while their asylum cases were heard
The number of migrants encountered by Border Patrol along the Mexican border rose to their highest recorded level in fiscal 2021, according to data analyzed last month by Pew.
The Border Patrol reported 1,659,206 encounters with migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border last fiscal year, narrowly exceeding the prior highs of 1,643,679 in 2000 and 1,615,844 in 1986.
Under Biden's new policy - first reported by Axios on November 24; confirmed by The Washington Post on Wednesday, with the Post saying the news would be officially announced on Thursday - the migrants will once again be sent back to Mexico.
The major difference is that they will be offered a COVID vaccination, but they cannot be forced to accept it.
Officials in the United States are
