In response to the Biden administration’s decision to cement harmful asylum policies and flout United States obligations under international human rights and refugee law, Amy Fischer, Director of Refugee and Migrant Rights at Amnesty International USA, made the following statement:
“Rather than showing any kind of moral leadership, the Biden administration remains hellbent on doubling down on deadly deterrence policies that are rooted in white supremacy and exacerbate the traumas and harms of people seeking safety in the United States.
“As the United States continues to witness the racist and anti-Black rhetoric about Haitian immigrants, we must also be equally disgusted and dismayed by policies that put Haitians, and other Black, Brown, and Indigenous people seeking safety, in danger.
“Racist rhetoric about invasions at the border and fear mongering about how people seeking safety are security threats fuel policies that deny people their human right to seek safety, force them to wait in danger in Mexico for months, jail them in inhumane conditions, and deport them back to danger.
“The policies that the Biden Administration is cementing today have been temporarily in place for months now and the results are clear: they don’t work.
“The United States, a country that was once seen as a beacon of humanitarian protection, is presenting a false choice to people fleeing for their lives and who are now at risk of kidnapping, extortion, and physical…
