Talk:Asylum in the United States

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Advice requested on US Refugee Policy Article
My graduate class and I (the professor) would like to create an article on US Policy towards refugees, specifically focusing on refugees from Middle East countries. I see that there will be a little bit of overlap with this article. I don't imagine there will be much, as we are more interested in conflicts in home countries, initial host country issues, US policies, and resettlement trends than we are legal issues and asylum.

Do you foresee any problems or issues that I should be aware of before we embark? Or any advice on the topic? Thank you. unsigned comment added by Radavis147 (talk • contribs) 00:53, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Asylum in the United States
Can you explain what issues you feel require the attention of an expert on the talk page of Asylum in the United States? I don't see it. Thanks, BanyanTree 04:06, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I am of the opinion that the larger section "Relevant law and procedures" should be edited for clarity, and the sub-section "Application for asylum by individuals in the United States" might benefit from a reorganization. For example, it is not quite clear to me how the quotas interact with the actual procedure for applying for asylum, or whether the quotas only pertain to those who apply in U.S. embassies rather than upon arrival.  Second, I thought that it is very difficult to apply for asylum upon arrival in the United States, in which case the section makes it sound easier than it is.  Third, the section on "Application for resettlement by refugees abroad" seems to provide insufficient context for understanding of the process:  what happens when a refugee shows up at the U.S. embassy in their country of origin?  It seems the section applies only to those who have already fled to a second country, and now wish to come to the United States, rather than those who flee directly from their country of origin to the U.S. embassy in that country.  Maybe this scenario is uncommon, is not practical, or is not safe, but if that is the case, the first two paragraphs of "Relevant law and procedures" (which serve as a sort of "mini-lead") should provide the required context.  Reason for the  tag is that it would be best if any changes were made by an expert, but also that an expert should review the  section to see if any changes are necessary at all.  Thank you.  69.140.152.55 (talk) 13:01, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

100K Mexicans flee drug violence to United States
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2011/03/20113266558960317.html

Worth a mention here? Hcobb (talk) 23:25, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Stat in opening paragraph incorrect?
From the last sentence of the opening paragraph: "The U.S. accounted for 15% to 20% of all asylum-seeker acceptances in the OECD countries in recent years."

I believe this is incorrect. Looking at the cited spreadsheet, I suspect this figure was taken from the number of asylum seekers accepted into North America, not just the United States. The United States have accepted somewhere around the 10-14% mark in recent years according to my calculation. I derived my figure by dividing the figure on row 37 (United States) by that on row 40 (OECD) for each year. Can someone confirm I'm correct and make the change if they agree? Ajmccluskey (talk) 18:50, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
 * You are entirely correct. Using the numbers in the cited spreadsheet total in 1998-2007 for US is 436,452; total for OECD is 4,455,197; that's 9.8% (if looking at the individuals years, it ranges from 5.9 to 14.5%). Not sure how this mistake remained for so long but I've now corrected it. 62.107.218.4 (talk) 10:24, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 08:30, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

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Missing references
There are missing references in paragraphs such as those under The Character of refugee inflows and resettlement. Only source is shown in the graphics which re-directs to another wikipedia article. Paragraphs with facts should have reliable references. Where is the information coming from?

Also, under Refugee quotas, it states: "Claims were doublechecked for any suspicious activity and procedures were put in place to detect any possible terrorist infiltration, though some advocates noted that, given the ease with which foreigners can otherwise legally enter the U.S., entry as a refugee is comparatively unlikely." This is stated with no referenecs from a reliable source which makes it possible to be considered as a biased comment.

Itgonzal (talk) 18:47, 4 November 2016 (UTC)Itgonzal

Addition of preferred characteristics of refugees
How could I work in a section about the preferred characteristics of asylum seekers? This would discuss traits common to successful asylum claims that lie outside the scope of official qualifications (examples: European descent, wealthy, religious affiliations).

Also, this article could be strengthened through editing. For example, the qualifications for constructing a legitimate asylum claim appear in the lead, "Individual Application," and "INS v. Cordoza-Fonseca precedent" sections. Streamlining the information would make the article shorter and easier to follow. Additionally, Information about the court cases discussed could be made more uniform. Currently the Fidel Armando Alfonso and Fauziya Kasinga cases have brief blurbs in the "Individual Application" section while the "INS v. Cordoza-Fonseca" section is robust and stands alone. Finally, information about the two films should be edited, as these discussion distract from the article. Rusty shackleford (talk) 21:15, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Regarding de facto preferences for granting refugee status, the key is to find a reliable secondary source that discusses it. I would imagine there might be an academic study on the subject.  --Nowa (talk) 21:43, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

Article Evaluation: Missing Citations and Critique of Claim for Likelihood to be Granted Asylum
The first note I had was that the claim that “After 2001, asylum officers and immigration judges became less likely to grant asylum to applicants, presumably because of the attacks on 11 September.[15]” is a slightly biased

The study concludes


 * “Considerations relating to physical integrity abuses, which are supposed to be at the heart of asylum decisions, seem to matter more at the initial stage of the process, where asylum officers screen claims, than they do for the immigration judges. However, we remain cautious, for it could be that asylum officers disproportionately accept asylum applicants in cases from human rights–abusing countries, thus biasing the sample of cases that are left for judges to decide. With a similar caveat in mind, it does appear that judges are more apt to grant asylum to persons from countries that are important to US security, evidenced by the receipt of US military aid. And asylum officers are evidently willing to deny claims from persons hailing from English-speaking countries, but are more cautious than judges in denying cases involving persons from Arabic- and Spanish-speaking countries”

and that “Asylum officers were more apt to deny claims after 2001..” linking tentatively to the terrorist attacks of “the same year.” This does not indicate a continuous regression in granting asylum. In order to make this claim, there should be a more recent statistics from 2009-2017 to make the claim.

The second thought I had was that as a very large article, this could do with some reorganization. The information on the Individual Application section is very long, breaking down to specific examples of cases where asylum was granted. These cases could be integrated into the subset of refugee claim examples, as the law cannot be separated from the experience of refugee claims.

The final thing I want to note in this article is the state of citations. The “Relevant Law and procedures” section has no citations, and neither does “Character of refugee inflows and resettlement.” The Section Film Has three points where citations have been documented as needed. The link in Citation 10 is broken. This article could do with clarifying where what information is coming from, as it is not clear if the un-cited sections are due to the source book on the bottom of the page.--Vwdesmondi (talk) 16:51, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

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Proposed contributions to "U.S. government support after arrival" and "Application for resettlement by refugees abroad"
Hello! I'm a student at UC Berkeley and I'm interested in contributing to this article as a part of one of my courses through the Global Poverty & Practice minor at my university. I am hoping to contribute to two sections: "U.S. government support after arrival" and "Application for resettlement by refugees abroad" For the former, I'd like to propose making it more comprehensive and focused on linking resources (both internal and external links) that provide resettlement support. I think this could be organized by state, since it's focused on the United States, or by non-profit versus government bodies. I'd like to split the section into Resources subheadings and an update on the current forced migration crisis (2015-present) and any impacts it has had on domestic policy. This is what the section currently looks like, but I'd like to clarify it and do more research to update this section. For the latter, I'd like to double check the citations in order to supplement my own research and also to update the application process according to any recent changes in policy. Please let me know of any advice you might have before I endeavor on these edits! Thank you!! Butnotsowithus (talk) 08:54, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

How many asylum *seekers* were there?
I'm surprised this statistic isn't listed at the top along with admissions and the percentage of acceptance, by year. Sorry I don't have a reference to provide... Adsah98 (talk) 12:08, 4 December 2019 (UTC)

Sources to add depth and complexity to the understanding of Asylum in the United States
Berthold, S. Megan, et al. “Chapter 5; Migration Policies in Europe and the United States .” Refugees and Asylum Seekers: Interdisciplinary and Comparative Perspectives, Praeger, an Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC, 2019.

Bray, Ilona, et al. “CHAPTER 1: Immigration Then and Now. America: A Nation of Immigrants.” How to Get a Green Card, July 2018, pp. 5–10. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=lir&AN=130623093&site=eds-live.

Brown, Joel. 2019. “Offering a Helping Hand to Migrants Waiting to Enter the U.S.” Boston University Law Review 99 (6): 2309–11. https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=140949538&site=eds-live.

Masetta-Alvarez, Katelyn. “Tearing Down the Wall between Refuge and Gang-Based Asylum Seekers: Why the United States Should Reconsider Its Stance on Central American Gang-Based Asylum Claims.” Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law, vol. 50, no. 1/2, Spring 2018, pp. 377–409. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=130957822&site=eds-live.

Nawyn, Stephanie J. Faithfully Providing Refuge: The Role of Religious Organizations in Refugee Assistance and Advocacy. 2017. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edssch&AN=edssch.oai%3aescholarship.org%2fark%3a%2f13030%2fqt63x0r2ng&site=eds-live.

Rabben, Linda. “10. The Golden Door Ajar: US Asylum Policy.” Sanctuary and Asylum: a Social and Political History, University of Washington Press, 2016.

I will use these sources to edit the sections ‘U.S. government support after arrival’, ‘obstacles faced by asylum seekers’ and ‘criticism’. The section ‘U.S. government support after arrival’ is very vague stating that people have access to public assistance but does not break down who is actually eligible, how to receive the public assistance and what is truly available to people. Likewise it states how much money the Obama administration allocated to refugee admittance so I would like to add how much the Trump admin is allocating and where that money is going. For the ‘obstacles faced by asylum seekers’ I want to restructure this portion to be its own section and then have subsections talking about gender, climate, gang violence, domestic violence and LGBTQ+. Currently this section is disorganized and does not address gang violence, domestic violence, or climate while there are 4 sections that talk about LGBTQ+ issues of asylum. I will condense the LGBTQ+ information because there is a lot of repetition and then add the other subsections. The ‘criticism’ section is very short and vague. I would like to expand on how judges have a lot of power in deciding who receives asylum using information from Sanctuary and Asylum: a Social and Political History. Does anyone have any advice on my sources or other sources I can use? Thank you! --Sion00 (talk) 20:29, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Refugee versus Asylum
Recommend all mentions of refugee programs be deleted unless in the article solely to illustrate the difference between the two legal frameworks. Bemcfarland (talk) 16:42, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Agreed. Many people don't understand the differences between refugees and those seeking asylum. This makes that worse. Po-tee-weet (talk) 01:24, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

Why does an article on Asylum in the US have so much about Refugee law?
While this article provides a lot of good information on refugee law, and is clearly the product of much hard work, it has nothing to do with asylum law, other than the basis of the underlying grounds of asylum (fear persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group by the government or someone the government is unable or unwilling to control). All of the really excellent refugee material should be on its own page, so the asylum page can just contain content relevant to asylum. Asylum is legal (talk) 18:18, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

I agree. This page only contributes to confusion the distinc Po-tee-weet (talk) 01:20, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

I agree. This confuses refugees and those granted asylum. That's already an area of common confusion. Po-tee-weet (talk) 01:22, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

Criticism Sec, outdated, unsourced 1st Paragraph
The 1st paragraph of the criticism section refers to a "recent empirical analysis by three legal scholars." It doesn't provide a citation, the law article is from 2007, and the sentence is inaccurate beyond being outdated.

The citation is: Jaya Ramji-Nogales, Andrew I. Schoenholtz, and Philip G. Schrag, Refugee Roulette: Disparities in Asylum Adjudication, 60 Stan. L. Rev. 295 (2007); https://ssrn.com/abstract=983946

Wiki has a separate (likely unwarranted) page based on it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refugee_roulette

The page currently states: "A recent empirical analysis by three legal scholars described the U.S. asylum process as a game of refugee roulette, meaning that the outcome of asylum determinations depends largely on the personality of the particular adjudicator to whom an application is randomly assigned, rather than on the merits of the case."

At a minimum, "largely on the personality of the particular adjudicator to whom an application" should be changed to "largely on to which particular adjudicator an application."

The study uses the word "personality" in the first sentence, but that is a quote from Attorney General Robert Jackson in 1940. The study finds variation among offices, regions, and individuals. It never says personality is the largest factor. My suggestion is at best a feeble band aid.

The concept is valid and worthy of inclusion.

I lack the sophistication to word these concerns in the proper form or make changes myself.

I would additionally note the 3rd sentence is not logically connected to the "refugee roulette" question. The admission of Iraqi refugees is unrelated to the discrepancy among judges in granting asylum.

I apologize I can't be more helpful. Po-tee-weet (talk) 06:54, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

I made progress on this myself. Po-tee-weet (talk) 23:18, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Global Poverty and Practice
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Wiki Education assignment: Global Poverty and Practice
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Child Separation, Barriers Sections
The child separation section doesn't even mention asylees. I'm leaning toward removing it -- especially since it was only in effect for a few months, more than five years ago -- but I wanted to see if anyone had objections first.

The barriers section feels very abstract and academic to me, and disconnected from the reality of asylum law. For example, the gender and LGBT sections heavily discuss the sociological implications of performing identity, but not that being a woman is specifically not grounds for asylum per the INA and that an characteristic that qualifies you for asylum can be real or imputed. I really dislike the way this section is written, but I'm also in the field myself so I'm hesitant to edit it heavily, in case I'm being nitpicky without meaning to. I'd welcome any thoughts on the subject. NuanceQueen (talk) 04:23, 30 May 2024 (UTC)


 * Also, does the climate change section really need to be there? NuanceQueen (talk) 04:24, 30 May 2024 (UTC)