SECURING THE BORDER
10773
- - - - - - BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
A PROCLAMATION
There are more people around the world who are displaced
from their homes today than at any point in time since World War
II. Many factors have contributed to this problem. Failing
regimes and dire economic conditions afflict many countries,
including several in the Western Hemisphere. Violence linked to
transnational criminal organizations has displaced substantial
numbers of people in Latin America. The global COVID-19 pandemic
upended societies around the globe. Natural disasters have
forced people from their homes.
As a result of these global conditions, we have been
experiencing substantial levels of migration throughout the
Western Hemisphere, including at our southwest land border. In
2019, encounters nearly doubled from their 2018 level to almost
1 million. In 2020, the global COVID-19 pandemic led countries
throughout the world to shut their borders and suspend
international travel; however, once the pandemic began to
recede, international travel resumed, and we again experienced
elevated levels of migration throughout the Western Hemisphere,
including at our southwest land border.
On May 11, 2023, as part of my Administration's work to
prepare for the end of the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention's public health order under title 42, United States
Code, and to return to processing all noncitizens under
immigration authorities under title 8, United States Code (title
8), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department
of Justice (DOJ) issued a final rule, entitled Circumvention of
Lawful Pathways (Lawful Pathways rule), encouraging the use of

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lawful pathways and imposing a rebuttable presumption of asylum
ineligibility on those who do not use them.
The Lawful Pathways rule was designed to address the high
levels of migration throughout the Western Hemisphere and
further discourage irregular migration by encouraging migrants
to use lawful, safe, and orderly processes for entering the
United States or to seek protection in other partner nations;
imposing a presumptive condition on asylum eligibility for those
who fail to do so; and supporting the swift return of those who
do not have valid protection claims.
As a complement to the Lawful Pathways rule and associated
enforcement efforts, the Department of State and DHS have taken
significant steps to expand safe and orderly pathways for
migrants to enter the United States lawfully. Those steps
include establishing Safe Mobility Offices in Colombia, Costa
Rica, Ecuador, and Guatemala to facilitate access to lawful
pathways; expanding country-specific and other available
processes to seek parole on a case-by-case basis for urgent
humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit; expanding
access to visa programs for seasonal employment; establishing a
mechanism for noncitizens to schedule a time and place to
present at ports of entry in a safe, orderly, and lawful manner
through the CBP One mobile application; and expanding refugee
admissions from the Western Hemisphere from 5,000 in Fiscal Year
2021 to up to 50,000 in Fiscal Year 2024.
The Lawful Pathways rule and these complementary measures
have made a substantial impact. On May 12, 2023, DHS returned to
processing all noncitizens under title 8 immigration authorities
and is processing noncitizens at record scale and efficiency.
Since then, my Administration has maximized the use of expedited
removal to the greatest extent possible given limited resources,
placing more than 970 individuals encountered at and between

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ports of entry at the southwest land border into the process
each day on average and conducting more than 152,000 credible
fear interviews, both of which are record highs. As a result,
from May 12, 2023, to May 1, 2024, my Administration removed or
returned more than 720,000 noncitizens who did not have a lawful
basis to remain in the United States, the vast majority of whom
crossed the southwest land border. Total removals and returns in
the 12 months following May 12, 2023, exceeded removals and
returns in every full Fiscal Year since 2010. The majority of
all individuals encountered at the southwest land border from
Fiscal Year 2021 to Fiscal Year 2023 were removed, returned, or
expelled.
Despite these efforts, and after months of reduced
encounter levels following the changes put in place after May
12, 2023, encounter levels increased toward the end of 2023, and
December 2023 saw the highest level of encounters between ports
of entry in history, as increasing numbers of people migrated
through the Western Hemisphere. The challenges presented by this
surge in migration, which would have been even worse had the
Lawful Pathways rule and other measures not been in place, were
compounded by the fact that the surge was focused increasingly
on western areas of the border in California and Arizona that
are geographically remote, challenging to address, and without
sufficient pre-existing infrastructure or resources to respond
to the surge. From January to March 2024, encounters decreased
from and have remained below levels experienced in November and
December 2023, including as a result of increased enforcement by
the United States and partner countries. However, the factors
that are driving the unprecedented movement of people in our
hemisphere remain, and there is still a substantial and elevated
level of migration that continues to pose significant
operational challenges.

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The current situation is also the direct result of the
Congress's failure to update an immigration and asylum system
that is simply broken -- and not equipped to meet current needs.
While my Administration has vigorously enforced the law within
the constraints imposed by the existing system, the statutory
framework put in place by the Congress is outdated. For the vast
majority of people in immigration proceedings, the current laws
make it impossible to quickly grant protection to those who
require it and to quickly remove those who do not establish a
legal basis to remain in the United States. This reality is
compounded by the fact that the Congress has chronically
underfunded our border security and immigration system and has
failed to provide the resources or reforms it needs to be able
to deliver timely consequences to most individuals who cross
unlawfully and cannot establish a legal basis to remain in the
United States.
Despite the strengthened consequences in place at our
border through the Lawful Pathways rule and the related measures
that have led to record returns and removals, encounter levels
are exceeding our capacity to deliver those consequences in a
timely manner due to the outdated laws and limited resources we
have available.
My Administration has repeatedly asked the Congress to
update the outdated and inadequate immigration statutes, to
create a legal framework that is functional and addresses
current realities, and to provide additional resources so that
we can more effectively deliver consequences at the border. In
August 2023, I requested more than $4 billion in additional
funding for border security and related migration issues,
including more than $2 billion for urgent DHS border management
requirements. The Congress failed to act. In October 2023, I
requested $13.6 billion for border enforcement and migration

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management. This request included more than $5 billion for DHS
to manage conditions on the southern border, as well as funding
for critical capacity enhancements to keep the southern border
secure. The Congress once again failed to provide our border and
immigration system with the resources it needs to deliver timely
consequences to those who cross unlawfully.
In early February 2024, a bipartisan group of Senators
introduced legislation (bipartisan legislative proposal)
containing the toughest and fairest reforms of our asylum laws
in decades that would have provided new authorities to
significantly streamline and speed up immigration enforcement
proceedings for individuals encountered at the border, including
those who are seeking protection. Critically, the bipartisan
legislative proposal included nearly $20 billion in additional
resources for DHS and other departments to implement those new
authorities, such as:
(a) over 1,500 new U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)
personnel, including Border Patrol agents and CBP officers;
(b) over 4,300 new asylum officers and additional U.S.
Citizenship and Immigration Services staff to facilitate timely
and fair decisions;
(c) 100 new immigration judge teams to help reduce the
asylum caseload backlog and adjudicate cases more quickly;
(d) shelter and critical services for newcomers in our
cities and States; and
(e) 1,200 new U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
personnel for functions including enforcement and deportations.
While the bipartisan legislative proposal did not include
everything we wanted, senior officials from my Administration
worked closely with the bipartisan group of Senators to ensure
that the reforms would adequately address the challenges that we
have been facing at our southern border for more than a decade.

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However, the Congress failed to move forward with this
bipartisan legislative proposal.
The Further Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2024 (Public
Law 118-47) increased funding for DHS over Fiscal Year 2023, but
it did not address the needs identified in various related
supplemental requests, nor did it equip the Federal Government
with the new authorities from the bipartisan legislative
proposal. In May 2024, when the Senate again considered the
bipartisan legislative proposal, the Senate failed to advance
the measure.
Our broken immigration system is directly contributing to
the historic migration we are seeing throughout the Western
Hemisphere, exacerbated by poor economic conditions, natural
disasters, and general insecurity, and this fact, combined with
inadequate resources to keep pace, has once again severely
strained our capacity at the border. The result is a vicious
cycle in which our United States Border Patrol facilities
constantly risk overcrowding, our detention system has regularly
been at capacity, and our asylum system remains backlogged and
cannot deliver timely decisions, all of which spurs more people
to make the dangerous journey north to the United States.
The Congress's failure to deliver meaningful policy reforms
and adequate funding, despite repeated requests that they do so,
is a core cause of this problem. Under current law, whenever a
noncitizen in expedited removal indicates an intention to apply
for asylum or a fear of persecution, they are referred for an
interview with an asylum officer and cannot be removed through
expedited removal if there is a significant possibility that
they could establish eligibility for asylum. This screening
standard is a requirement imposed by the Congress, but it has
not functioned well in predicting ultimate success in asylum
proceedings. From 2014 to 2019, 83 percent of individuals

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referred for an interview with an asylum officer passed the
screening stage, meaning that they were not removed pursuant to
expedited removal, but less than 25 percent of cases ultimately
resulted in a grant of asylum or other protection, often after
waiting years to reach a final decision. By imposing a
rebuttable presumption of asylum ineligibility on those who
cross the border unlawfully, the Lawful Pathways rule has made a
meaningful impact in reducing this disparity. The screen-in rate
from May 12, 2023, to March 31, 2024, dropped to 52 percent for
individuals who are subject to the rebuttable presumption of
asylum ineligibility. However, the Lawful Pathways rule alone is
inadequate during times of record encounter levels and cannot
change the underlying statutory limitations.
Data confirm that the system has been badly strained for
many years and is not functioning to provide timely relief for
those who warrant it or timely consequences for those without
viable protection claims. Due to an outdated and inefficient
system and insufficient resources that do not allow for prompt
adjudication of claims, too many people have had to be processed
by the Border Patrol and released with a notice to appear in
removal proceedings before an immigration judge since May 2023.
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service affirmative asylum
backlog is now over 1 million cases and growing, with over
300,000 applications filed prior to 2021 still pending. At the
end of Fiscal Year 2023, there were over 2.4 million cases
pending in the immigration courts. Pending cases more than
doubled from the end of Fiscal Year 2016 to the end of Fiscal
Year 2020 and doubled again between that time and the end of
Fiscal Year 2023. Between Fiscal Year 2006 and the end of Fiscal
Year 2023, in tandem with historic increases in filings to
initiate immigration court proceedings, the immigration courts'
pending caseload increased from approximately 170,000 to

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approximately 2.46 million. During Fiscal Year 2023, immigration
judges completed more cases than they ever had before in a
single year, but more than twice as many cases were received by
the immigration courts than were completed.
The status quo system -- the result of outdated laws and
inadequate resources -- has become a driver for unlawful
migration throughout the region and an increasingly lucrative
source of income for dangerous transnational criminal
organizations and other criminal smuggling organizations that,
without countermeasures, will continue to grow in strength and
pose significant threats to the safety and security of United
States communities and migrants, as well as countries throughout
the region.
Considering these trends and the decades-long failure of
the Congress to address the problem through systemic reform and
adequate funding, and following the Congress's failure to pass
the bipartisan legislative proposal, I must exercise my
executive authorities to meet the moment. This proclamation
answers the call by suspending entry of noncitizens across the
southern border during this time of high border crossings.
Appropriate exceptions are provided, such as for those who are
particularly vulnerable or present pursuant to a process the
Secretary of Homeland Security determines is appropriate to
allow for safe and orderly processing into the United States.
That process will continue to allow for individuals to seek
entry to this country each day in a safe and orderly manner, and
following their arrival, to seek protection through the
appropriate process. This proclamation, in conjunction with
steps to be taken by DOJ and DHS, is needed to enhance our
ability to address the historic levels of migration and more
efficiently process migrants arriving at the southern border
given current resource levels.

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These actions do not change or fully compensate for the
fact that our immigration system is under-resourced and broken,
nor do they change the fact that there are significant limits to
what can be achieved without the Congress fulfilling its
responsibility to help solve the unprecedented challenge that we
are facing. No executive action can deliver the significant
policy reforms and additional resources that were in the
bipartisan legislative proposal. But I will continue to take
actions, within these constraints, to address the situation at
our southern border.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR., President of the
United States, by the authority vested in me by the Constitution
and the laws of the United States of America, including sections
212(f) and 215(a) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8
U.S.C. 1182(f) and 1185(a)) and section 301 of title 3, United
States Code, hereby find that, absent the measures set forth in
this proclamation, the entry into the United States of persons
described in section 1 of this proclamation under circumstances
described in section 2 of this proclamation would be detrimental
to the interests of the United States, and that their entry
should be subject to certain restrictions, limitations, and
exceptions. I therefore hereby proclaim the following:
Section 1. Suspension and Limitation on Entry. The entry of
any noncitizen into the United States across the southern border
is hereby suspended and limited, subject to section 3 of this
proclamation. This suspension and limitation on entry shall be
effective at 12:01 a.m. eastern daylight time on June 5, 2024.
The suspension and limitation directed in this proclamation
shall be discontinued pursuant to subsection 2(a) of this
proclamation, subject to subsection 2(b) of this proclamation.
Sec. 2. Applicability of Suspension and Limitation on
Entry. (a) The Secretary of Homeland Security shall monitor the

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number of daily encounters and, subject to subsection (b) of
this section, the suspension and limitation on entry pursuant to
section 1 of this proclamation shall be discontinued at 12:01
a.m. eastern time on the date that is 14 calendar days after the
Secretary makes a factual determination that there has been a 7consecutive-calendar-day average of less than 1,500 encounters,
not including encounters described in subsection 4(a)(iii) of
this proclamation.
(b) Notwithstanding a factual determination made under
subsection (a) of this section, the suspension and limitation on
entry pursuant to section 1 of this proclamation shall apply at
12:01 a.m. eastern time on the calendar day immediately after
the Secretary has made a factual determination that there has
been a 7-consecutive-calendar-day average of 2,500 encounters or
more, not including encounters described in subsection 4(a)(iii)
of this proclamation, until such suspension and limitation on
entry is discontinued pursuant to subsection (a) of this
section.
(c) For purposes of subsection (a) and subsection (b) of
this section, unaccompanied children (as defined in section
279(g)(2) of title 6, United States Code) from non-contiguous
countries shall not be included in calculating the number of
encounters.
Sec. 3. Scope and Implementation of Suspension and
Limitation on Entry. (a) The suspension and limitation on entry
pursuant to section 1 of this proclamation shall apply across
the southern border to noncitizens, other than those described
in subsection (b) of this section, during such times that the
suspension and limitation on entry is in effect.
(b) The suspension and limitation on entry pursuant to
section 1 of this proclamation shall not apply to:
(i) any noncitizen national of the United States;

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(ii) any lawful permanent resident of the United
States;
(iii) any unaccompanied child as defined in section
279(g)(2) of title 6, United States Code;
(iv) any noncitizen who is determined to be a victim
of a severe form of trafficking in persons, as defined
in section 7102(16) of title 22, United States Code;
(v) any noncitizen who has a valid visa or other
lawful permission to seek entry or admission into the
United States, or presents at a port of entry pursuant
to a pre-scheduled time and place, including:
(A) members of the United States Armed Forces and
associated personnel, United States Government
employees or contractors on orders abroad, or
their accompanying family members who are on
their orders or are members of their household;
(B) noncitizens who hold a valid visa or who have
all necessary documents required for admission
consistent with the requirements of section
1182(a)(7) of title 8, United States Code, upon
arrival at a port of entry;
(C) noncitizens traveling pursuant to the visa
waiver program as described in section 1187 of
title 8, United States Code; and
(D) noncitizens who arrive in the United States
at a southwest land border port of entry pursuant
to a process the Secretary of Homeland Security
determines is appropriate to allow for the safe
and orderly entry of noncitizens into the United
States;
(vi) any noncitizen who is permitted to enter by the
Secretary of Homeland Security, acting through a CBP

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immigration officer, based on the totality of the
circumstances, including consideration of significant
law enforcement, officer and public safety, urgent
humanitarian, and public health interests at the time
of the entry or encounter that warranted permitting
the noncitizen to enter; and
(vii) any noncitizen who is permitted to enter by the
Secretary of Homeland Security, acting through a CBP
immigration officer, due to operational considerations
at the time of the entry or encounter that warranted
permitting the noncitizen to enter.
(c) An exception under subsection (b) of this section from
the suspension and limitation on entry pursuant to section 1 of
this proclamation does not affect a noncitizen's inadmissibility
under the Immigration and Nationality Act for a reason other
than the applicability of this proclamation.
(d) The Secretary of Homeland Security and the Attorney
General are authorized to issue any instructions, orders, or
regulations as may be necessary to implement this proclamation,
including the determination of the exceptions in subsection (b)
of this section, and shall promptly consider issuing any
instructions, orders, or regulations as may be necessary to
address the circumstances at the southern border, including any
additional limitations and conditions on asylum eligibility that
they determine are warranted, subject to any exceptions that
they determine are warranted.
(e) Nothing in this proclamation shall limit the statutory
processes afforded to unaccompanied children upon entering the
United States under section 279 of title 6, United States Code,
and section 1232 of title 8, United States Code.
Sec. 4. Definitions. (a) The term "encounter" refers to a
noncitizen who:

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(i) is physically apprehended by CBP immigration
officers within 100 miles of the United States
southwest land border during the 14-day period
immediately after entry between ports of entry;
(ii) is physically apprehended by DHS personnel at the
southern coastal borders during the 14-day period
immediately after entry between ports of entry; or
(iii) is determined to be inadmissible at a southwest
land border port of entry.
(b) The term "southern coastal borders" means all maritime
borders in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida;
all maritime borders proximate to the southwest land border, the
Gulf of Mexico, and the southern Pacific coast in California;
and all maritime borders of the United States Virgin Islands and
Puerto Rico.
(c) The term "southwest land border" means the entirety of
the United States land border with Mexico.
(d) The term "southern border" means the southwest land
border and the southern coastal borders.
Sec. 5. Severability. It is the policy of the United States
to enforce this proclamation to the maximum extent possible to
advance the interests of the United States. Accordingly, if any
provision of this proclamation, or the application of any
provision to any person or circumstance, is held to be invalid,
the remainder of this proclamation and the application of its
provisions to any other persons or circumstances shall not be
affected thereby.
Sec. 6. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this
proclamation shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
(i) the authority granted by law to an executive
department or agency, or the head thereof; or

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(ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of
Management and Budget relating to budgetary,
administrative, or legislative proposals.
(b) This proclamation shall be implemented consistent with
applicable law and subject to the availability of
appropriations.
(c) This proclamation is not intended to, and does not,
create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural,
enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United
States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers,
employees, or agents, or any other person.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this third
day of June, in the year of our Lord two thousand twenty-four,
and of the Independence of the United States of America the two
hundred and forty-eighth.
[FR Doc. 2024-12647 Filed: 6/6/2024 8:45 am; Publication Date: 6/7/2024]