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Law360 (April 20, 2020, 3:53 PM EDT ) President Donald Trump said on Monday night that he will sign an executive order temporarily suspending all immigration to the U.S. in light of the coronavirus pandemic.
"In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!" Trump wrote on Twitter shortly after 10 p.m.
The president did not offer any further details on the upcoming order, including what categories of immigration would be affected and what the order would mean for immigrants already working legally in the U.S.
Representatives for the White House and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security didn't immediately return requests for more details on Monday night.
If signed, and if as described, the executive order would mark the most sweeping restrictions on immigration in the U.S. during the pandemic, which has already led to orders blocking asylum-seekers and restricting travel from foreigners who have recently spent time in countries suffering from a coronavirus outbreak.
At the same time, however, the federal government has recently sought to ease the visa process for foreign agricultural workers and foreign doctors to assist the U.S. during the pandemic.
Trump's Twitter announcement comes hours after his administration extended orders for 30 days that have closed off the U.S. borders to nonessential travel and blocked all migrants who enter the U.S. without legal documentation, including asylum-seekers and unaccompanied children.
In a notice also posted Monday, Robert R. Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said he will extend to May 20 his initial order calling on the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to turn away all migrants who arrive at or cross a U.S. border without proper legal documentation.
There have been more than 760,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the U.S. as of Monday, according to estimates from Johns Hopkins University, and Redfield noted that the disease has continued to spread since his first order in March.
"The entire country has mobilized to save lives by limiting face-to-face contact and reserving medical and healthcare resources for those who need them most," he wrote. "At a time when these domestic efforts are ongoing and effective, it would be counterproductive and dangerous to undermine those efforts by permitting the introduction of persons from outside the United States who pose a risk of transmission of COVID-19 within DHS facilities or the U.S. interior."
The CDC order has come under fire from human rights advocates who say the exclusion policy conflicts with the U.S.' obligations not to send people back to danger.
As of April 9, according to the latest figures published by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, border officers had sent back more than 6,000 migrants under the new order, which draws on a little-used public health statute that predates the passage of key refugee laws.
Eleanor Acer, director of refugee protection at Human Rights First, said in a statement Monday that the administration's decision to extend the border expulsion policy "constitutes a further disregard for international law and worsens an ongoing human rights tragedy in progress."
She urged the administration to continue processing asylum claims while maintaining social distancing measures and exploring alternatives to hold migrants in detention facilities.
"The CDC must immediately rescind this order. It is simply another attack by the Trump administration on the asylum process rather than a policy aimed at improving public health," she said.
As the U.S. — like other countries across the globe responding to the coronavirus pandemic — has moved to seal off its borders to foreigners, the country has also continued to deport people, even threatening visa sanctions against countries that refuse to accept its deportees. Earlier this month, Guatemala's health minister said that 75% of deportees on a U.S. deportation flight tested positive for COVID-19.
In an April 14 statement, Refugees International called on the Trump administration to cease these deportation flights until foreigners can first be tested to avoid spreading the coronavirus to countries with weaker health care systems.
"Continuing to deport sick people who lack access to healthcare, a financial safety net, or even basic necessities like potable water once they arrive in Guatemala is irresponsible and places unnecessary risks on some of the most vulnerable," said Rachel Schmidtke, Refugees International's advocate for Latin America.
--Editing by Daniel King.
Update: This story has been updated with information about President Trump's executive order announcement.
For a reprint of this article, please contact reprints@law360.com.
