The United States Supreme Court has agreed to review a legal challenge against a controversial tactic called “metering”, which the federal government has used to turn away asylum seekers who arrive at its borders but are prevented from crossing.

On Monday, the justices granted a petition from the administration of President Donald Trump to review a lower court ruling that found “metering” to be an unlawful impediment to the asylum process.

Recommended Stories

list of 3 itemsend of list

The case, known as Al Otro Lado v Noem, had previously been weighed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, California. That court found that “metering” violated federal law granting non-citizens the right to apply for asylum in the US.

“Metering” refers to the practice of turning away asylum seekers who arrive at official ports of entry into the US, on the basis that border officials are “at capacity”.

Asylum seekers who were turned away were often left on the Mexican side of the southern border without safeguards or a timeline for when their asylum application would be accepted.

A two-to-one majority on the Ninth Circuit Court ruled in 2024 that such action amounted to a “withholding” of asylum rights, rather than a simple delay.

The fight over ‘metering’

Al Otro Lado, the migration advocacy nonprofit that helped bring the case, said in a news release on Monday that it would “look forward to presenting [its] case” to the Supreme Court, which has a six-to-three conservative majority.

“As the Ninth Circuit correctly concluded, our immigration laws require the government to inspect and process people seeking asylum at ports of entry and allow them to pursue their legal claims in the United States,” the advocacy group said in a statement.

Advertisement

“The government’s turnback policy was an illegal scheme to circumvent these requirements by physically blocking asylum seekers arriving at ports of entry and preventing them from crossing the border to seek protection.”

Al Otro Lado also argued that the “metering” policy left asylum seekers in dangerous conditions on the Mexican side of the border, where they could face extortion from criminal networks and corrupt officials alike.

“Vulnerable families, children, and adults fleeing persecution were stranded in perilous conditions where they faced violent assault, kidnapping, and death,” it wrote.

US law allows individuals fleeing a well-founded fear of persecution to seek asylum within its borders. Protected groups include those facing violence for their race, religion, nationality, political leanings or membership in a particular social group.

Successive administrations have long encouraged asylum seekers to present themselves at official ports of entry to file their claims, rather than crossing the border through irregular channels.

Advocates point out that “metering” appears to send the opposite message: that presenting yourself at an official port of entry could result in being turned away indefinitely.

The Trump administration, however, has sought to restrict asylum applications in general, and it has argued that “metering” is a necessary tool in preventing abuse within the asylum system.

Lawyers for the Trump administration maintain that “metering” does not violate asylum laws because it applies to would-be applicants who have simply arrived at the border, but not crossed it.

“Allied forces did not ‘arrive in’ Normandy while they were still crossing the English Channel,” the US Department of Justice said in its court filings, employing a World War II reference.

It also used a sports metaphor, comparing crossing the border to scoring a touchdown in American football. “A running back does not ‘arrive in’ the end zone when he is stopped at the one-yard line,” the Justice Department wrote.

Restricting asylum in the US

The practice of “metering” began in 2016, when US officials at the border began turning away asylum seekers. The practice became formalised in 2018, with the federal government citing capacity issues amid a growing influx of arrivals.

The initial lawsuit was filed in 2017. In addition to Al Otro Lado, groups including the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies (CGRS), the Center for Constitutional Rights and the American Immigration Council have been among the groups representing 13 immigrants in the case.

Advertisement

“Metering” was ultimately halted in 2021, under President Joe Biden, after a federal court struck down the practice. But legal proceedings over the tactic have since continued, and other restrictions on the asylum process have since been put in place.

The Trump administration’s defence of “metering” comes as part of a larger debate over its asylum policies.

On January 20, the first day of his second term, Trump signed an executive order effectively banning asylum applications at the southern US border.

That asylum ban has been subject to a separate legal challenge. In July, US District Judge Randolph Moss struck down the ban, saying that it effectively creates an “alternative immigration system” separate from the protections Congress has established.

The Trump administration has appealed that decision as well.

While the asylum system was created, in large part, as a reaction to the widespread persecution that took place during the Holocaust and World War II, recent years have seen various governments seek to restrict asylum rights as part of a broader immigration crackdown.

Trump, for instance, campaigned for a second term on a platform that sought to dramatically scale back immigration to the US.

His administration has since petitioned other countries to join its efforts to overhaul the asylum and refugee system. In September, for instance, a Trump official held a panel on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly entitled, “Global Refugee Asylum System: What Went Wrong and How to Fix It”.

Then, a month later in October, the Trump administration unveiled the lowest-ever cap on refugee admissions in US history.

Only 7,500 refugees would be allowed into the US in fiscal year 2026, according to a federal filing. Priority, it said, would be given to white Afrikaners from South Africa and “other victims of illegal or unjust discrimination”.

Critics, however, have dismissed Trump’s claims of an anti-white “genocide” in South Africa as false.