White House issues new rule limiting asylum seekers

The rule becomes effective once a presidential proclamation is issued, which is expected to happen Friday, according to senior administration officials.

The administration announced a new federal rule -- issued by the Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department -- that will limit eligibility for asylum seekers coming from Mexico, in a call with reporters Thursday afternoon.

The rule does not specify whom it applies to, but discusses the issue in the context of increasing asylum claims from Central America.

"We do not expect one action" to solve immigration problems, the officials said.

This is just one effort to address the issue and "I would expect we would work on additional measures in the future," one official said.

The American Civil Liberties Union called the rule "illegal."

"US law specifically allows individuals to apply for asylum whether or not they are at a port of entry. It is illegal to circumvent that by agency or presidential decree," said Omar Jadwat, director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project.

There was an effort to finalize the rule in time for the President to sign by Friday morning, before he leaves for Paris, according to a senior administration official.

Trump first revealed plans to take unilateral steps during a rambling and detail-free speech from the White House last week. Warning of a crisis at the southern border, Trump's remarks were viewed as a political stunt days before the midterms.

Since Tuesday's vote -- which saw Democrats take control of the House but Republicans retain control of the Senate -- the President hasn't mentioned the immigration orders or tweeted about the migrant caravan that formed his campaign closing argument.

A White House aide told CNN ahead of Trump's remarks last week the President would unveil an executive action requiring migrants to request asylum at legal points of entry and preventing them from claiming asylum if they are caught crossing the border illegally. Although the President referenced such a policy in his speech, he offered no defense of how such a plan, once finalized, could be legal, given laws presently allowing migrants the right to claim asylum once they are on American soil.

The Trump administration has been looking at ways to limit the number of asylum seekers, with the President and his allies often describing asylum as a "loophole."

The Immigration and Nationality Act says that anyone who arrives in the US "whether or not at a designated port of arrival" may apply for asylum if he or she has a "well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion."

CNN has also reported the administration is considering a plan to limit the number of migrants able to enter at legal ports of entry by "metering," essentially creating a waitlist to allow people to enter only if the Department of Homeland Security has the capacity to process and detain them at one of its facilities, a department official said.

In the past, the practice of metering has resulted in individuals deciding not to endure a lengthy wait to try to get into the country legally and instead to cross illegally. Should some of this group of migrants do the latter, they could face a tougher and higher standard for seeking asylum under the administration's plans.