Jean Lantz Reisz, University of Southern California
Mon 20 January 2025
THE CONVERSATION
Vice President JD Vance, President Donald Trump and their families attend the inaugural parade in Washington on Jan. 20, 2025. Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images
During his first day in office on Jan. 20, 2025, President Donald Trump signed a slew of executive orders on immigration that would make it harder for refugees, asylum seekers and others to try to enter the U.S. – and for some immigrants to stay in the country.
On Monday night, Trump signed executive orders that included declaring a national emergency at the U.S.-Mexico border and pausing refugee admissions for at least four months. Migrants trying to enter the U.S. at the border also found that CBP One, an app they used to schedule asylum application appointments, was shut down.
Amy Lieberman, a politics editor at The Conversation U.S., spoke with scholar Jean Lantz Reisz, co-director of the University of Southern California’s Immigration Clinic and a clinical associate professor of law, to understand the meaning of Trump’s new executive orders – and the challenges he could face in implementing them.
Vice President JD Vance applauds as Donald Trump gestures during the inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025. Kevin Lamarque-Pool/Getty Images
Will Trump be able to carry out these many executive orders?
When it comes to immigration and national security, the president has a broad range of powers. We are hearing that Trump is trying to end asylum. Migrants at the U.S. border today had their appointments with Customs and Border Protection canceled.
There will be litigation because asylum is a big part of U.S. law and only a Congressional act can end it. Using different kinds of national security and public health actions, like Title 42, an emergency health order that allowed the government to turn away migrants at the border because of COVID-19, has been successful in the past at making it harder for people to seek asylum – but a presidential action cannot end asylum.
If Congress wanted to end asylum, it would be a terrible thing in the world of international human rights, but it could still happen.
Trump announced he will reinstate the Remain in Mexico program, which requires people seeking asylum in the U.S. to remain in Mexico while they await their court date. It would require Mexico’s cooperation to do this, especially since this would apply to migrants who are not even from Mexico. Usually, this kind of announcement would have to first be published in the Federal Register for comment. This procedure has not been followed here and could leave this policy open to legal challenges.
What does it actually mean to shut down the border?
We don’t have the details yet, but it looks like shutting down the border means the U.S. government will no longer process any migrants coming to the border without visas for asylum or other kinds of humanitarian relief.
Up until now, if a migrant comes to the U.S. border and says they fear returning to their home country, they are supposed to be given a so-called “credible fear interview.” That would be suspended. People have the right to seek asylum under U.S. law, and by shutting the border down, the president is preventing people from exercising that right.
Now, under Trump’s orders, migrants who are crossing into the country and seeking asylum or humanitarian parole at a U.S. border port of entry will be denied the right to stay in the country, even temporarily. Everyone who crosses the border will be immediately expelled from the country.
That is an immediate impact that is already being felt at the border. But for people who already crossed the U.S. border and applied for asylum, their situations have not changed, according to these executive orders. This is also unlikely to affect people who have visas to enter the country or those conducting any commerce across the border.
Trump announced that he will use the Alien Enemies Act to deport immigrants who are in the country illegally. Are there limits on his ability to do that?
The president has the authority to invoke the Alien Enemies Act, a law from 1798 that allows a president to detain and deport noncitizen males during times of war. This is aimed at making it easier to deport people who have been suspected of belonging to a drug cartel.
But the U.S. government then has to prove that it is at war with the migrant’s country of origin, and that the drug cartels represent this entire country and government. In the immigration system, a president can deport someone who is suspected of supporting or belonging to a drug cartel or terrorist group, but Trump may be using the Alien Enemies Act to deport a targeted group of persons more quickly.
The Alien Enemies Act does allow a federal court to review whether or not a person being targeted by the U.S. government is actually an alien enemy. This hasn’t actually played out for almost 100 years, but someone could challenge the government’s designation that they are a foreign enemy and take the claim to a federal court, or all the way up to the Supreme Court.
What are some of the other big changes that you will be watching?
First, The Washington Post reported that the Trump administration will end birthright citizenship, which gives U.S. citizenship to U.S.-born children of noncitizens. I think that would play out by Trump issuing orders to federal agencies like the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and the Social Security Administration to not process citizen’s applications for passports or Social Security numbers if they cannot demonstrate that the citizen’s parents were lawfully present in the U.S. at the citizen’s birth.
That would then be challenged with lawsuits because the president can’t just say there is no more birthright citizenship when it is part of the U.S. Constitution.
I am also expecting mass arrests of immigrants living in the U.S. without legally authorized status through workplace raids targeting them. The president has the authority to arrest everyone who is in unlawful status. But most immigrants living in the U.S. without legal authorization have the right to go in front of an immigration judge to argue that they are lawfully in the U.S. There is a long backlog right now of cases in immigration court. It could also be prohibitively expensive to arrest, detain and deport the millions of people that Trump wants to deport.
Finally, by declaring a national emergency at the southern border, Trump could use Department of Defense funding for immigration enforcement and allow the military and the National Guard to help patrol the border and build a border wall.
The National Guard has assisted in border security administrative work under Joe Biden’s administration, as well as Barack Obama’s and Trump’s, by doing things like mending fences and stocking warehouses. This freed up more Border Patrol and Customs and Border Protection agents to go out and actually arrest immigrants. That is nothing new.
But the way Trump is saying he is going to enlist military to do the law enforcement would likely be challenged. U.S. law says you cannot use the military in internal law enforcement operations.
This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trustworthy analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. It was written by: Jean Lantz Reisz, University of Southern California
Read more:
Trump’s executive orders can make change – but are limited and can be undone by the courts
Trump’s idea to use military to deport over 10 million migrants faces legal, constitutional and practical hurdles
Texas is already policing the Mexican border − and will play an outsize role in any Trump plan to crack down on immigration
Vice President JD Vance, President Donald Trump and their families attend the inaugural parade in Washington on Jan. 20, 2025. Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images
During his first day in office on Jan. 20, 2025, President Donald Trump signed a slew of executive orders on immigration that would make it harder for refugees, asylum seekers and others to try to enter the U.S. – and for some immigrants to stay in the country.
On Monday night, Trump signed executive orders that included declaring a national emergency at the U.S.-Mexico border and pausing refugee admissions for at least four months. Migrants trying to enter the U.S. at the border also found that CBP One, an app they used to schedule asylum application appointments, was shut down.
Amy Lieberman, a politics editor at The Conversation U.S., spoke with scholar Jean Lantz Reisz, co-director of the University of Southern California’s Immigration Clinic and a clinical associate professor of law, to understand the meaning of Trump’s new executive orders – and the challenges he could face in implementing them.
Vice President JD Vance applauds as Donald Trump gestures during the inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025. Kevin Lamarque-Pool/Getty Images
Will Trump be able to carry out these many executive orders?
When it comes to immigration and national security, the president has a broad range of powers. We are hearing that Trump is trying to end asylum. Migrants at the U.S. border today had their appointments with Customs and Border Protection canceled.
There will be litigation because asylum is a big part of U.S. law and only a Congressional act can end it. Using different kinds of national security and public health actions, like Title 42, an emergency health order that allowed the government to turn away migrants at the border because of COVID-19, has been successful in the past at making it harder for people to seek asylum – but a presidential action cannot end asylum.
If Congress wanted to end asylum, it would be a terrible thing in the world of international human rights, but it could still happen.
Trump announced he will reinstate the Remain in Mexico program, which requires people seeking asylum in the U.S. to remain in Mexico while they await their court date. It would require Mexico’s cooperation to do this, especially since this would apply to migrants who are not even from Mexico. Usually, this kind of announcement would have to first be published in the Federal Register for comment. This procedure has not been followed here and could leave this policy open to legal challenges.
What does it actually mean to shut down the border?
We don’t have the details yet, but it looks like shutting down the border means the U.S. government will no longer process any migrants coming to the border without visas for asylum or other kinds of humanitarian relief.
Up until now, if a migrant comes to the U.S. border and says they fear returning to their home country, they are supposed to be given a so-called “credible fear interview.” That would be suspended. People have the right to seek asylum under U.S. law, and by shutting the border down, the president is preventing people from exercising that right.
Now, under Trump’s orders, migrants who are crossing into the country and seeking asylum or humanitarian parole at a U.S. border port of entry will be denied the right to stay in the country, even temporarily. Everyone who crosses the border will be immediately expelled from the country.
That is an immediate impact that is already being felt at the border. But for people who already crossed the U.S. border and applied for asylum, their situations have not changed, according to these executive orders. This is also unlikely to affect people who have visas to enter the country or those conducting any commerce across the border.
Trump announced that he will use the Alien Enemies Act to deport immigrants who are in the country illegally. Are there limits on his ability to do that?
The president has the authority to invoke the Alien Enemies Act, a law from 1798 that allows a president to detain and deport noncitizen males during times of war. This is aimed at making it easier to deport people who have been suspected of belonging to a drug cartel.
But the U.S. government then has to prove that it is at war with the migrant’s country of origin, and that the drug cartels represent this entire country and government. In the immigration system, a president can deport someone who is suspected of supporting or belonging to a drug cartel or terrorist group, but Trump may be using the Alien Enemies Act to deport a targeted group of persons more quickly.
The Alien Enemies Act does allow a federal court to review whether or not a person being targeted by the U.S. government is actually an alien enemy. This hasn’t actually played out for almost 100 years, but someone could challenge the government’s designation that they are a foreign enemy and take the claim to a federal court, or all the way up to the Supreme Court.
What are some of the other big changes that you will be watching?
First, The Washington Post reported that the Trump administration will end birthright citizenship, which gives U.S. citizenship to U.S.-born children of noncitizens. I think that would play out by Trump issuing orders to federal agencies like the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and the Social Security Administration to not process citizen’s applications for passports or Social Security numbers if they cannot demonstrate that the citizen’s parents were lawfully present in the U.S. at the citizen’s birth.
That would then be challenged with lawsuits because the president can’t just say there is no more birthright citizenship when it is part of the U.S. Constitution.
I am also expecting mass arrests of immigrants living in the U.S. without legally authorized status through workplace raids targeting them. The president has the authority to arrest everyone who is in unlawful status. But most immigrants living in the U.S. without legal authorization have the right to go in front of an immigration judge to argue that they are lawfully in the U.S. There is a long backlog right now of cases in immigration court. It could also be prohibitively expensive to arrest, detain and deport the millions of people that Trump wants to deport.
Finally, by declaring a national emergency at the southern border, Trump could use Department of Defense funding for immigration enforcement and allow the military and the National Guard to help patrol the border and build a border wall.
The National Guard has assisted in border security administrative work under Joe Biden’s administration, as well as Barack Obama’s and Trump’s, by doing things like mending fences and stocking warehouses. This freed up more Border Patrol and Customs and Border Protection agents to go out and actually arrest immigrants. That is nothing new.
But the way Trump is saying he is going to enlist military to do the law enforcement would likely be challenged. U.S. law says you cannot use the military in internal law enforcement operations.
This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trustworthy analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. It was written by: Jean Lantz Reisz, University of Southern California
Read more:
Trump’s executive orders can make change – but are limited and can be undone by the courts
Trump’s idea to use military to deport over 10 million migrants faces legal, constitutional and practical hurdles
Texas is already policing the Mexican border − and will play an outsize role in any Trump plan to crack down on immigration
SHLOCK AND AWE
Mon 20 January 2025
Just hours after the inauguration, migrants with CBP One appointments along the U.S.-Mexico border learned that all CBP One appointments were canceled. Dozens of asylum seekers in Matamoros, Mexico, were turned away in near-freezing temperatures.
STORY: As U.S. President Donald Trump took office on Monday and began a sweeping immigration crackdown, migrants waiting in Mexico nervously checked the U.S. government app known as CBP One.
The program had allowed hundreds of thousands of migrants to enter the U.S. legally by scheduling an appointment.
Some 280,000 people had been logging into the app daily to secure an appointment as of January 7.
Then on Monday, an alert came through: "Existing appointments scheduled through CBP One are no longer valid.”
U.S. border authorities confirmed they had shut down the app and canceled appointments, leaving migrants like Nidia Montenegro from Venezuela in tears.
"I waited four months in Tapachula. We were left in limbo. We don't know what to do. Really, the joy we had, it stops here. We don't know what we're going to do, we're left in limbo."
Montenegro says she fled violence and poverty at home in Venezuela and survived a kidnapping as she traveled north into Mexico.
She made it to the border city of Tijuana on Sunday for a U.S. asylum appointment on Wednesday to finally reunite her with her son in New York, but it was too late.
"Well, they are authoritarian and they have every right to change the rules of the game but they don't take into account everything we have done as migrants."
Montenegro is among thousands of migrants who had their hopes of legally reaching the U.S. suddenly dashed ahead of their appointments.
The move is one of the Trump administration’s first measures aimed at curbing immigration.
The American Civil Liberties Union said in a federal court filing on Monday that Trump's decision to end the CBP One program removed the only avenue to asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border -
- as they gear up to fight Trump's agenda in court.
Republicans recaptured the White House after promising to intensify border security and deport record numbers of migrants.
Biden toughened his approach on immigration last year and the number of migrants caught illegally crossing the border with Mexico fell dramatically.
Asylum restrictions last June blocked most migrants crossing illegally from claiming asylum, instead encouraging them to use new legal entry programs, including CBP One.
A Day In, The New Trump Administration Is Already Causing Terrifying Damage
Natasha Jokic
Tue 21 January 2025
Note: This post is an Op-Ed and shares the author's personal views.
Yesterday, shortly after Donald Trump was inaugurated, the CBP One app shut down.
Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images
The flawed app was the only way that people at the border could get an appointment to request asylum in the US. This meant that refugees suddenly found that their appointments to legally enter the country were canceled after months of waiting. The number of appointments canceled reportedly went into the tens of thousands.
As The International Rescue Committee puts it, "Asylum is a form of protection granted to individuals who can demonstrate that they are unable or unwilling to return to their country because of persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of: race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion."The Washington Post / The Washington Post via Getty ImagesMore
One such place was at the border in Ciudad Juarez, where the app had worked earlier that morning and allowed people to go through as planned. I can't stop thinking about one of the pictures that emerged from the area. It's of Margelis Tinoco, a 48-year-old Colombian migrant.
Christian Chavez / AP
Washington Post reporter Arelis R. Hernández shared a video of Margelis crying and calling for God, adding, "For clarification, everyone of these folks submitted biometric, biographical & other ID info to the U.S. govt via app in order to enter the country LEGALLY through this Biden admin program that sought to cut illegals entries. They had DHS-sanctioned appointments set for today."
Twitter: @arelisrhdz
ADVERTISEMENT
Her feelings are echoed in migrant Maria Mercado's story. As per AP News, her family had an appointment for 1 p.m. — just four hours too late. “We don’t know what we are going to do,” she told reporters, after having to leave both Colombia and Ecuador because of drug cartel violence. "I’m not asking the world for anything — only God. I’m asking God to please let us get in."
A person in a hooded jacket comforts a child wrapped in a blanket on a busy sidewalk, surrounded by others clad in warm clothing
People sitting together, some wearing masks and hoodies, appear concerned while looking at a phone screen inside a room with corrugated metal walls
Anadolu / Anadolu via Getty Images, Picture Alliance / dpa/picture alliance via Getty Images
Around 400 people typically used the app to cross the border legally per day in Tijuana.
Another person, Jairol Polo, had been able to get an appointment on Wednesday after trying for six months. He subsequently flew to the Matamoros-Brownsville border, only to find out that the appointment was canceled. "Imagine how we feel,” he told AP News. Similarly, a woman tearfully told NBC News that her appointment had been canceled after a year and a half of waiting.
People sitting closely together, looking somber, with heads bowed. One person is on a phone. The setting suggests a serious or reflective moment
Two individuals embrace warmly, one looking directly at the camera, conveying a sense of comfort and support
Guillermo Arias / AFP via Getty Images, Picture Alliance / dpa/picture alliance via Getty Images
Some Trump supporters celebrated the move, falsely claiming it would halt people "breaking the law." While the path to asylum died, plenty of billionaires had a great time celebrating Trump's inauguration.
Pool / Getty Images
There is currently no way to appeal, thanks to a man who doesn't appear to know the difference between political and mental asylum. But that's the Trump way: misinformed and callously cruel.
Rafael Bernal
Mon 20 January 2025
Trump administration officials minutes after the new president took office on Monday shut down a mobile app for migrants to make appointments at the U.S.-Mexico border.
By shutting down the CBP One app, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials essentially canceled all outstanding appointments made by migrants without visas who sought to enter the United States through legal ports of entry.
The app shutdown is part of a series of moves by the incoming administration to crack down on the border, even as migration has decreased significantly in the past six months.
According to CBP numbers, U.S. officials encountered 96,048 foreign nationals at the border in December. About half, 48,722, presented at a port of entry to get formal admission into the United States.
ADVERTISEMENT
Before November, the last full month with fewer than 100,000 encounters was January of 2021, the month when former President Biden was sworn in. That month, CBP encountered 78,414 people, only 3,098 of whom presented at ports of entry — the rest were encountered by the Border Patrol after crossing the border illegally.
CBP One was a key component of the Biden administration’s efforts to channel migrants through legal pathways to seek refuge in the United States.
President Trump is due to sign 10 executive orders on Monday related to the border, several of which seek to undo those pathways.
The actions are designed to essentially shut down the border and return to policies used during the first Trump administration, like the so-called remain in Mexico policy.
Under that policy, at the time known officially as the Migrant Protection Protocols, around 70,000 third-country nationals were returned to Mexico over the span of two years to await the results of their U.S. asylum cases.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved.
Asylum seekers with CBP One appointments turned away in Mexico as Trump ends use of border app
Mon 20 January 2025
Just hours after the inauguration, migrants with CBP One appointments along the U.S.-Mexico border learned that all CBP One appointments were canceled. Dozens of asylum seekers in Matamoros, Mexico, were turned away in near-freezing temperatures.
STORY: As U.S. President Donald Trump took office on Monday and began a sweeping immigration crackdown, migrants waiting in Mexico nervously checked the U.S. government app known as CBP One.
The program had allowed hundreds of thousands of migrants to enter the U.S. legally by scheduling an appointment.
Some 280,000 people had been logging into the app daily to secure an appointment as of January 7.
Then on Monday, an alert came through: "Existing appointments scheduled through CBP One are no longer valid.”
U.S. border authorities confirmed they had shut down the app and canceled appointments, leaving migrants like Nidia Montenegro from Venezuela in tears.
"I waited four months in Tapachula. We were left in limbo. We don't know what to do. Really, the joy we had, it stops here. We don't know what we're going to do, we're left in limbo."
Montenegro says she fled violence and poverty at home in Venezuela and survived a kidnapping as she traveled north into Mexico.
She made it to the border city of Tijuana on Sunday for a U.S. asylum appointment on Wednesday to finally reunite her with her son in New York, but it was too late.
"Well, they are authoritarian and they have every right to change the rules of the game but they don't take into account everything we have done as migrants."
Montenegro is among thousands of migrants who had their hopes of legally reaching the U.S. suddenly dashed ahead of their appointments.
The move is one of the Trump administration’s first measures aimed at curbing immigration.
The American Civil Liberties Union said in a federal court filing on Monday that Trump's decision to end the CBP One program removed the only avenue to asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border -
- as they gear up to fight Trump's agenda in court.
Republicans recaptured the White House after promising to intensify border security and deport record numbers of migrants.
Biden toughened his approach on immigration last year and the number of migrants caught illegally crossing the border with Mexico fell dramatically.
Asylum restrictions last June blocked most migrants crossing illegally from claiming asylum, instead encouraging them to use new legal entry programs, including CBP One.
A Day In, The New Trump Administration Is Already Causing Terrifying Damage
Natasha Jokic
Tue 21 January 2025
Note: This post is an Op-Ed and shares the author's personal views.
Yesterday, shortly after Donald Trump was inaugurated, the CBP One app shut down.
Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images
The flawed app was the only way that people at the border could get an appointment to request asylum in the US. This meant that refugees suddenly found that their appointments to legally enter the country were canceled after months of waiting. The number of appointments canceled reportedly went into the tens of thousands.
As The International Rescue Committee puts it, "Asylum is a form of protection granted to individuals who can demonstrate that they are unable or unwilling to return to their country because of persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of: race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion."The Washington Post / The Washington Post via Getty ImagesMore
One such place was at the border in Ciudad Juarez, where the app had worked earlier that morning and allowed people to go through as planned. I can't stop thinking about one of the pictures that emerged from the area. It's of Margelis Tinoco, a 48-year-old Colombian migrant.
Christian Chavez / AP
Washington Post reporter Arelis R. Hernández shared a video of Margelis crying and calling for God, adding, "For clarification, everyone of these folks submitted biometric, biographical & other ID info to the U.S. govt via app in order to enter the country LEGALLY through this Biden admin program that sought to cut illegals entries. They had DHS-sanctioned appointments set for today."
Twitter: @arelisrhdz
ADVERTISEMENT
Her feelings are echoed in migrant Maria Mercado's story. As per AP News, her family had an appointment for 1 p.m. — just four hours too late. “We don’t know what we are going to do,” she told reporters, after having to leave both Colombia and Ecuador because of drug cartel violence. "I’m not asking the world for anything — only God. I’m asking God to please let us get in."
A person in a hooded jacket comforts a child wrapped in a blanket on a busy sidewalk, surrounded by others clad in warm clothing
People sitting together, some wearing masks and hoodies, appear concerned while looking at a phone screen inside a room with corrugated metal walls
Anadolu / Anadolu via Getty Images, Picture Alliance / dpa/picture alliance via Getty Images
Around 400 people typically used the app to cross the border legally per day in Tijuana.
Another person, Jairol Polo, had been able to get an appointment on Wednesday after trying for six months. He subsequently flew to the Matamoros-Brownsville border, only to find out that the appointment was canceled. "Imagine how we feel,” he told AP News. Similarly, a woman tearfully told NBC News that her appointment had been canceled after a year and a half of waiting.
People sitting closely together, looking somber, with heads bowed. One person is on a phone. The setting suggests a serious or reflective moment
Two individuals embrace warmly, one looking directly at the camera, conveying a sense of comfort and support
Guillermo Arias / AFP via Getty Images, Picture Alliance / dpa/picture alliance via Getty Images
Some Trump supporters celebrated the move, falsely claiming it would halt people "breaking the law." While the path to asylum died, plenty of billionaires had a great time celebrating Trump's inauguration.
Pool / Getty Images
There is currently no way to appeal, thanks to a man who doesn't appear to know the difference between political and mental asylum. But that's the Trump way: misinformed and callously cruel.
Trump officials shut down CBP One app
Rafael Bernal
Mon 20 January 2025
Trump administration officials minutes after the new president took office on Monday shut down a mobile app for migrants to make appointments at the U.S.-Mexico border.
By shutting down the CBP One app, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials essentially canceled all outstanding appointments made by migrants without visas who sought to enter the United States through legal ports of entry.
The app shutdown is part of a series of moves by the incoming administration to crack down on the border, even as migration has decreased significantly in the past six months.
According to CBP numbers, U.S. officials encountered 96,048 foreign nationals at the border in December. About half, 48,722, presented at a port of entry to get formal admission into the United States.
ADVERTISEMENT
Before November, the last full month with fewer than 100,000 encounters was January of 2021, the month when former President Biden was sworn in. That month, CBP encountered 78,414 people, only 3,098 of whom presented at ports of entry — the rest were encountered by the Border Patrol after crossing the border illegally.
CBP One was a key component of the Biden administration’s efforts to channel migrants through legal pathways to seek refuge in the United States.
President Trump is due to sign 10 executive orders on Monday related to the border, several of which seek to undo those pathways.
The actions are designed to essentially shut down the border and return to policies used during the first Trump administration, like the so-called remain in Mexico policy.
Under that policy, at the time known officially as the Migrant Protection Protocols, around 70,000 third-country nationals were returned to Mexico over the span of two years to await the results of their U.S. asylum cases.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved.
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