Government

The U.N. Should Sanction The USA For Trump's New Asylum Rule

Trump's new asylum rule violates U.S. and international law.

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Now that the United States has become a rogue nation that supports and exports the policies of ethnic cleansing, one wonders if the international community will ever find the strength and resolve to stop us. It’s easy enough for the U.N. to step in and impose sanctions on countries that commit human rights violations of international law — they do it all the time, especially when the bad actors are petty dictators in predominately brown countries. But now that the United States is the bad actor, is the U.N. going to do anything? Or are they merely the international bullies rogue states have always accused them of being: unable and unwilling to address the abuses of powerful nations, only picking on the small ones without nukes?

Donald Trump’s new asylum rule is a clear violation of U.S. and international law, and should trigger some response from any international body with the guts to speak truth to power. The order requires asylum seekers to present themselves at “ports of entry” in order to apply for asylum. Trump is seeking to prevent people from seeking asylum who enter the country “illegally.”

There are numerous problems with that rule, and I’ll get to the legal issues, but first and foremost the rule is inhumane. People who are seeking asylum are FLEEING terror. If they could enter the country legally, THEY WOULDN’T BE SEEKING ASYLUM. The asylum process is there for people who have no other option. Making a legal/illegal distinction is banal when you are talking about people begging for sanctuary.

Most of Trump’s attempts to ethnically cleanse the country of non-white immigrants and their families involve violations of norms, or Constitutional interpretations that are only supported by the authoritarian conservatives who happen to be on the Supreme Court. This attempt seems to directly violate a section of U.S. law:

8 U.S. Code § 1158 – Asylum

(a) Authority to apply for asylum
(1) In general
Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien’s status, may apply for asylum in accordance with this section or, where applicable, section 1225(b) of this title.

ANY person can apply for asylum, regardless of whether they arrive at a port of entry.

Trump’s proclamation is a point-and-click violation of the asylum statute. You’d expect any court to invalidate his order at its earliest opportunity… until you remember that the Supreme Court authorized an unconstitutional religious test just this summer, and that was before the conservative majority was strengthened by the addition of an alleged attempted rapist who thinks that the president is imbued with dictatorial powers.

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We have to assume that the U.S. courts are now useless when it comes to protecting the rights of non-whites who make the grave mistake of setting foot in the “land of the free.”

However, in the international context, the rights of asylum seekers are well developed. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights acknowledges the rights of people to seek asylum in other countries. While the methods for seeking that protection obviously differ between nation-states, one well-established principle is that asylum seekers cannot be punished for the manner in which they entered the country in which they are seeking asylum. From the International Justice Research Center:

In accordance with Article 31 of the 1951 Convention, States parties provide in their domestic law that an applicant’s irregular entry (i.e., without an entry visa or other documentation) will not have a negative effect on the asylum seeker’s application.

Trump’s asylum order places us in violation of these conventions and principles. Somebody should tell him that. From the BBC:

Human rights group Amnesty International also came out against the rule.

Secretary General Kumi Naidoo issued a statement attacking the president’s “dehumanising rhetoric”.

“Asylum is not a loophole, it is a lifeline,” Mr Naidoo said. “This policy needlessly places the lives of thousands of people in danger.”

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Strong words from the Secretary General of Amnesty International are nice. But it’s time for the Secretary General of the United Nations to get in the game.

To this point, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres has played a cute game of footsie with the American president. He’s been reluctant to directly criticize Trump by name, while expressing dismay at some of the United States’ new policies. He’s basically international Jeff Flake — someone who seems real worried who will yet do nothing to STOP the madness of King Trump.

The weakness of the U.N. response to Trump is perhaps more noticeable if you have paid attention to African politics say, at any point postWorld War II. A sovereign leader of an African nation can’t so much as say boo to a colonizer without the U.N. and IMF and World Bank dashing out a threatening communiqué. Often, for my part, I’ve thought the international community was justified, but always there was the sense that these august international bodies wouldn’t have the stones to even rasp a white knuckle should America or a powerful European nation go down the ethnic cleansing road.

Here, Donald Trump has instituted a policy in clear violation of his own domestic law, well-established international principles, and human rights. He’s doing it to support a desire to ethnically cleanse his country of non-whites — whether they were born here or not — while capitalizing on racial resentment to make authoritarian gains.

We should be sanctioned for these actions. If the international community lacks the strength to punish us when we adopt policies of ethnic cleansing, then it lacks the moral authority to punish anyone else when they follow our lead to the bottom.

Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.

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