政治迫使拜登总统改变策略
【中美创新时报2024 年 6 月 5 日编译讯】（记者温友平编译）当唐纳德·特朗普 2018 年想要关闭南部边境时，他在庇护法中找到了一条 73 字的条款，他说这条条款赋予了他“神奇的权力”来阻止移民进入美国。拜登总统周二援引了同一项规定，他采取行政措施暂时关闭边境，禁止寻求庇护者进入美国，暂停了长期以来任何踏上美国领土的人都有权在美国寻求保护的保证。《纽约时报》记者迈克尔·D·希尔（Michael D. Shear）对此作了下述报道。
当唐纳德·特朗普 2018 年想要关闭南部边境时，他在庇护法中找到了一条 73 字的条款，他说这条条款赋予了他“神奇的权力”来阻止移民进入美国。
拜登总统周二援引了同一项规定，他采取行政措施暂时关闭边境，禁止寻求庇护者进入美国，暂停了长期以来任何踏上美国领土的人都有权在美国寻求保护的保证。
“简单的事实是，全球存在移民危机，”拜登在白宫发表讲话时说，“如果美国不保护我们的边境，试图来到这里的人数量将没有限制。”
拜登的声明对于一位多年来一直声称美国是一个移民国家的总统和政党来说是一个惊人的逆转。2012 年，当奥巴马总统想要巩固自己连任的机会时，他发布了一项关于移民的全面行政命令——该命令允许数百万移民合法留在美国。
十几年后，随着非法越境人数达到历史最高水平，下一任民主党总统完全朝着另一个方向发展。批评人士说，拜登正在采用特朗普和特朗普的移民沙皇斯蒂芬·米勒的策略来结束庇护制度，甚至使用特朗普引用的《移民和国籍法》中为禁止穆斯林国家旅行辩护的相同条款。
“斯蒂芬·米勒和唐纳德·特朗普在移民问题上兜售基于恐惧的政治，拜登白宫决定买账，”国家移民司法中心政策主管海蒂·奥尔特曼说。她称这是“危险的转变”，将“使美国与核心价值观和承诺背道而驰”。
多年来，拜登及其盟友等民主党人一直抨击特朗普执着于关闭边境。卡马拉·哈里斯 (Kamala Harris) 于 2017 年谴责特朗普，称“我们不能对数百万难民置之不理”。2018 年，民主党议员指责特朗普寻求终止庇护，煽动了“偏见之火”。2020 年，现任众议院民主党领袖哈基姆·杰弗里斯 (Hakeem Jeffries) 称特朗普为“仇外主义领袖”。
但随着创纪录数量的移民越过边境进入边境社区并蔓延到更远的城市，移民政策发生了变化。拜登也做出了相应的调整。总统意识到美国人想要更严格的政策，今年在两党立法中支持了限制措施。在特朗普呼吁共和党人否决该措施后，拜登和他的顾问们感到不得不另辟蹊径。
总统在离开华盛顿前往巴黎参加诺曼底登陆日庆祝活动前几个小时宣布了这一做法，并得到了许多民主党人的支持。拜登指责共和党人阻碍了改革移民制度的更广泛努力，党内许多市长和州长表示，现在是时候采取行动应对涌入他们城市的移民潮了。
拜登周二签署的宣言宣布，只要移民人数超过一定数量，就应该暂停庇护权。然后，他将门槛设定得足够低——平均每天 2,500 名移民——以便从周三凌晨 12:01 开始立即暂停。
事实上，由于气候变化、经济不稳定和世界各地的政治暴力引发的全球移民浪潮，近一年来，这一门槛几乎每天都被超过。尽管这一数字低于 12 月 10,000 名移民的峰值，但仍远高于十年前每天约 1,000 名移民的平均水平。官员们表示，这些限制不适用于独自越境的未成年人和少数真正担心在本国遭受酷刑或迫害的人。
拜登和负责竞选活动的助手们打赌，选民会奖励总统为限制非法越境人数而采取的新举措。他们希望此举能减轻纽约和丹佛等民主党领导的城市的压力，这些城市正在努力为移民提供食物和住所。
他们相信，这些行动将使拜登对特朗普和共和党人做出有力的反击，他们长期以来一直指责民主党在边境问题上软弱无力。
但此举也肯定会激怒拜登的一些支持者，尤其是那些已经在学生贷款和气候变化等一系列其他问题上对总统表示不满的左翼人士。
拜登和他的助手们对他们追随特朗普脚步的指控感到愤怒。
总统正确地指出，他已经排除了前任的一些极端政策，比如在边境将儿童与父母分开，以向移民发出不要来美国的信息。拜登上任第一天就提出了一项移民改革计划，该计划将为数百万移民提供入籍途径。共和党人拒绝考虑这项提议。
“我永远不会妖魔化移民，”拜登周二在白宫表示。“我永远不会说移民毒害了一个国家的血液。此外，我永远不会在边境将儿童与家人分开。我不会因为宗教信仰而禁止人们进入这个国家。”
但新措施是严厉的打击。
总统周二发布的一项措施是，如果移民在总统的庇护禁令生效期间被发现试图非法入境，则禁止他们在五年内（即使是通过合法途径）进入美国。几十年来，自由派一直在反对这种延长的禁令。
在采取行政措施阻止移民的合法权力来源方面，拜登也得出了与特朗普和米勒相同的结论。
《移民和国籍法》第 212(f) 条规定：“只要总统发现任何外国人或任何类别的外国人进入美国会损害美国的利益，他可以通过公告，在他认为必要的期限内，暂停所有外国人或任何类别的外国人作为移民或非移民入境，或对外国人入境施加他认为适当的任何限制。”
多年来，法律学者一直在争论这些词的含义。当最高法院支持特朗普的旅行禁令时，首席大法官约翰·罗伯茨写道，该条款“在每一个条款中都表现出对总统的尊重”。美国公民自由联盟表示，法院在该案中的裁决是错误的，“是其最大的失败之一，让人想起了它允许歧视性地监禁日裔美国人的判决。”
二月份，米勒表示特朗普应该在第二任期内以“强硬”的方式使用该条款，并呼吁将其作为“在边境建立堡垒地位并禁止任何人越境”的努力的一部分。
本文最初发表于《纽约时报》。
题图：拜登总统。ROD LAMKEY JR./NYT
附原英文报道：
Politics is forcing President Biden to shift gears
By Michael D. Shear New York Times,Updated June 5, 2024
WASHINGTON — When Donald Trump wanted to shut down the southern border in 2018, he found a 73-word provision in the asylum law that he said gave him “magical authorities” to keep migrants out of the country.
President Biden turned to that same provision Tuesday as he took executive action to temporarily close the border to asylum-seekers, suspending long-standing guarantees that anyone who steps onto U.S. soil has the right to ask for protection in America.
“The simple truth is, there is a worldwide migrant crisis,” Biden said in remarks at the White House, “and if the United States doesn’t secure our border, there’s no limit to the number of people who may try to come here.”
Biden’s announcement is a stunning reversal for a president and a party that spent years arguing that America was a country of immigrants. When President Barack Obama wanted to shore up his chances of reelection in 2012, he issued a sweeping executive order on immigration — one that allowed millions of immigrants to stay in the country legally.
A dozen years later, with the number of people crossing the border illegally at historic highs, the next Democratic president moved entirely in the other direction. Critics say Biden is adopting the tactics of Trump and Stephen Miller, Trump’s immigration czar, to end asylum, even using the same clause in the Immigration and Nationality Act that Trump cited to justify a travel ban on Muslim countries.
“Stephen Miller and Donald Trump peddled fear-based politics on immigration, and the Biden White House has decided to buy,” said Heidi Altman, the policy director at the National Immigrant Justice Center. She called it “a dangerous shift” that will “put the United States at odds with core values and commitments.”
For years, Democrats like Biden and his allies assailed Trump for his obsession with closing the border. Kamala Harris denounced him in 2017, saying that “we can’t turn our backs on the millions of refugees.” In 2018, Democratic lawmakers accused Trump of stoking “the fires of bigotry” by seeking an end to asylum. In 2020, Hakeem Jeffries, now the top Democrat in the House, called Trump the “Xenophobe. In. Chief.”
But the politics of immigration have shifted as record numbers of migrants have crossed into border communities and spread to cities far beyond. Biden has adjusted accordingly. Sensing that Americans want tougher policies, the president backed restrictive measures in bipartisan legislation this year. After Trump called on Republicans to kill that measure, Biden and his advisers felt compelled to find another way.
The president has rallied many Democrats behind the approach, which he announced just hours before leaving Washington for a five-day visit to Paris for D-Day celebrations. Biden blames Republicans for standing in the way of broader efforts to overhaul the immigration system, and many mayors and governors in his party say the time has come to finally do something to address the surge of migration into their cities.
The proclamation that Biden signed Tuesday declared that asylum rights should be suspended whenever migration surged past a certain number. He then set the threshold low enough — at an average of 2,500 migrants each day — that the suspension would be prompted right away, starting at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday.
In fact, that threshold has been exceeded almost every day for nearly a year, thanks to a wave of global migration fueled by climate change, economic instability and political violence around the world. And even though it is lower than the peak of 10,000 migrants in December, it remains far higher than the average of about 1,000 migrants each day a decade ago. The restrictions will not apply to minors who cross the border alone and a small number of people who legitimately fear being tortured or persecuted in their home country, officials said.
Biden and the aides running his campaign are betting that voters will reward the president for newly aggressive efforts to limit the number of people crossing into the country illegally. They hope the move will relieve pressure on Democratic-led cities like New York and Denver, which are struggling to feed and house migrants.
And they believe the actions will give Biden a potent retort to Trump and Republicans, who have long accused Democrats of being weak on the border.
But the move is certain to inflame some of Biden’s supporters, too, especially those on the left who have already expressed frustration with the president on a range of other issues, like student loans and climate change.
Biden and his aides bristle at the accusation that they are following in Trump’s footsteps.
The president correctly notes that he has ruled out some of his predecessor’s extreme policies, such as separating children from their parents at the border to send a message to migrants that they should not come to the United States. On his first day in office, Biden proposed an immigration overhaul that would have provided a pathway to citizenship for millions of immigrants. Republicans refused to consider the proposal.
“I will never demonize immigrants,” Biden said at the White House on Tuesday. “I’ll never refer to immigrants as poisoning the blood of a country. And further, I’ll never separate children from their families at the border. I will not ban people from this country because of their religious beliefs.”
But the new measures are a sharp crackdown.
One measure included in the president’s proclamation Tuesday prohibits migrants from entering the United States for five years — even through a legal pathway — if they have been caught trying to enter illegally while the president’s asylum ban is in place. Liberals have been fighting against such extended bans for decades.
Biden has also reached the same conclusion as Trump and Miller when it comes to the source of their legal authority to take executive action to prevent migration.
Section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act reads, “Whenever the president finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.”
Legal scholars have debated for years the meaning of those words. When the Supreme Court upheld Trump’s travel ban, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that the provision “exudes deference to the president in every clause.” The American Civil Liberties Union said the court’s ruling in that case was wrong and “stands among its greatest failures, reminiscent of its decisions allowing the discriminatory incarceration of Japanese Americans.”
In February, Miller said Trump should use the provision in a “muscular” way during a second term and called for it to be part of an effort to “establish a fortress position on the border and say no one can cross here at all.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
