Tracking Trump On Immigration: Despite Focus, Many Ideas Are Stalled Or Blocked

President Trump is proposing a fundamental overhaul of the U.S. immigration system, including more border security and tougher standards for who could be admitted. It's the latest in a long line of White House efforts to reshape and restrict immigration.

But many of those efforts have been stymied by the courts, Congress, and the administration's critics at the state and local level. Here's a look at what the White House has accomplished on immigration — and what it hasn't.

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Merit-Based System

President Trump has laid out sweeping changes he'd like to make to the legal immigration system. The White House proposal would favor immigrants with higher skills and more education, and it would shift the immigration system away from family reunification, which has been its guiding principle since 1965.

But the proposal is getting little traction on Capitol Hill — particularly among Democrats, whose support would be necessary for the proposal to become law.

Travel Ban

The Trump administration's effort to restrict immigration and travel from several majority-Muslim countries was blocked by lower courts. But a modified version — including the majority-Muslim countries of Libya, Iran, Somalia, Syria and Yemen, plus North Korea and Venezuela — was upheld by the Supreme Court in a major victory for the White House.

Another legal challenge remains after a federal judge in Maryland ruled that lawsuit can go forward. But that could take years, so it may be a long time before people who are affected by the policy see a change , if any.

Sanctuary Cities

Federal courts have widely rejectedthe Justice Department's attempts to withhold law enforcement grants from so-called sanctuary cities that limit their cooperation with immigration authorities. In April, President Trump threatened to bus migrants from the border and then release them in sanctuary cities. But so far, his administration has not acted on those threats.

Asylum Crackdown

The White House wants to discourage migrants from seeking asylum in the U.S., arguing that many are abusing generous asylum laws to live and work in the country until their cases are heard in immigration court.

Courts have rejected some of the administration's tactics, including an effort to deny asylum to any migrant who crossed the border illegally. But the Justice Department has succeeded in making it harder to get asylum based on gang or domestic violence.

The DOJ is also moving to get rid of bond hearings for detained asylum-seekers. And the administration wants to amend a decades-old settlement called the Flores agreement in order to hold migrant families in detention for longer than a few weeks.

None of these changes have stopped migrant families from crossing the southern border in record numbers to escape from poverty and violence in Central America.

Remain in Mexico

Immigration authorities have sent about 5,000 thousand migrants back to Mexico to wait for months until a U.S. immigration court decides their asylum cases.

A federal court initially blocked the administration from sending asylum-seekers back to crime-ridden Mexican border towns where many are staying in shelters.

But the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the lower court's injunction, allowing the "Remain in Mexico" policy to continue while the case plays out. Now the case goes back to the same judge in San Francisco, who said the policy lacked sufficient protections for asylum-seekers.

Family Separation

The administration's "zero tolerance" policy was intended to deter asylum-seekers by separating migrant parents and children at the border — until President Trump ended the policy under pressure last June.

A federal judge has ordered the administration to reunite nearly 3,000 children with their parents. The same judge has since ordered the administration to identify what could be thousands of additional families that were separated before the "zero tolerance" policy took effect.

The Wall

After signing a spending bill to end the government shutdown in February, President Trump declared a national emergency in order to secure billions of additional dollars for his signature immigration policy: the border wall.

That emergency declaration is now being challenged in court by critics who say there is no emergency, and that the president is flouting the will of Congress in order to deliver on a key campaign promise.

Lawmakers have authorized more than $1.3 billion for 55 miles of steel fencing on the U.S.-Mexico border. The Trump administration wants to spend an additional $6 billion from military construction and counter-drug accounts to add to that total.

DACA

The Trump administration's efforts to end Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, are stalled in court. That means nearly 700,000 young immigrants who were brought to the country illegally as children are still protected from deportation and allowed to work legally — for now.

Democrats and moderate Republicans are likely to insist on some relief for DACA recipients as part of any comprehensive immigration overhaul, while immigration hardliners are wary of granting "amnesty" or a path to citizenship.

TPS

The administration has moved to wind down Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, for more than 400,000 immigrants from countries wracked by civil conflict or natural disasters.The immigrants are protected from deportation and allowed to work in the U.S.

A number of legal challenges have been filed. For instance, the Department of Homeland Security has been blocked from ending TPS for immigrants from Haiti, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Sudan by a judge in California.

Birthright Citizenship

Shortly before the 2018 midterm elections, President Trump threatened to end birthright citizenship, which is widely understood by legal scholarsto be guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. He has not followed through on that threat.

More than 30 countries have birthright citizenship, including Canada, Mexico, Brazil and Argentina.

Public Benefits

Homeland Security is working on rules that would make it harder for immigrants to get green cards, or bring other family members to the U.S., if they use a wide range of public benefits, such as food stamps and subsidized health insurance.

The final rule is still under development. But critics say the proposal is already scaring immigrants away from using benefits. Immigrant advocates and state and local governments are expected to challenge the rule in court once it's finalized.

Deportations

Arrests and deportations of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. spiked during the first two years of the Trump administration — for immigrants with and without criminal records. But the numbers remain well below the highest figures of President Obama's first term.

And the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement says arrests and deportations declined in early 2019 because the agency is devoting more resources to the southern border.

Still, immigrant advocates say aggressive enforcement by ICE continues to create a climate of fear among unauthorized migrants.

Public Housing

Thousands of families that include undocumented members could be forced out of public housing by a rule proposed by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. These families include estimated 55,000 children who are U.S. citizens or legal residents.

The rule is intended to prevent undocumented immigrants or mixed-status families from living in public housing. It's still in the public comment stage, and critics are pressuring HUD Secretary Ben Carson to reconsider.

Refugee Cap

The Trump administration has slashed the number of refugees the U.S. will accept. The official cap is set at 30,000 for the year, the lowest figure since the current refugee resettlement program began in 1980.

But the administration is on pace to admit far less than the current cap. Halfway through the fiscal year, the U.S. had admitted fewer than 13,000 refugees.

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