(Adnkronos) – With the favorable votes of the six conservative justices, and the dissenting votes of the three liberal justices, the Supreme Court has affirmed that the American government can legally reject asylum seekers before they set foot on American territory. The ruling therefore constitutes a victory for the Trump administration, which could thus reintroduce the practice, in force in the past, that allows border agents to turn back migrants before they can physically cross the border between the United States and Mexico, thereby preventing them from applying for asylum.
“In common parlance, no one would say that a person arrives at a place, be it a house, a city, or a country, before that person has physically entered it,” reads the ruling written by Justice Samuel Alito, supported by the other five conservative justices. “The Court’s illogical interpretation is guided almost entirely by focusing on a single word ‘in’,” writes Justice Sonia Sotomayor in her dissenting opinion, adding that “words, however, must be read in context.”
Indeed, the appeal on which the Supreme Court ruled relates to a case initiated in 2017 by the migrant rights group Al Otro Lado to defend 13 asylum seekers after the Obama administration in 2016 had informally begun to adopt the practice to respond to overcrowding at border crossings, particularly in the San Diego area.
