CLAIM: Democrat presidential candidate Joe Biden suggested during Thursday night’s debate that foreign nationals applying for asylum have always been allowed to asylum shop in the United States.
VERDICT: False. President Donald Trump has sought to broker agreements between the U.S. and Central America that mirror an existing agreement with the U.S. and Canada to stop foreign nationals from asylum shopping.
“This is the first president in the history of the United States of America that anybody seeking asylum has to do it in another country,” Biden said. “That’s never happened before in America. That’s never happened before in America. You come to the United States and you make your case based on the following premise.”
Biden’s claim that Trump is the first president to end the process of asylum shopping is untrue. Since 2002, the U.S. initiated a “Third Safe Country Agreement” with Canada that ensures foreign nationals cannot pass through Canada solely to seek asylum in the U.S. Instead, those foreign nationals must first seek asylum in Canada.
Trump, as former presidents have done, has sought to mirror that same U.S.-Canada agreement with Mexico and Central America to prevent massive waves of illegal immigration to the U.S. — particularly for the purpose of seeking asylum despite Mexico having a robust asylum system.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.
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