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EOIR Acting Director issues PM 25-28 to allow rejection of certain asylum claims without hearings

  1. Original Date Announced

    April 11, 2025

    EOIR Acting Director Sirce E. Owen issued Policy Memorandum 25-28, which sets forth EOIR's interpretation that current law allows immigration judges to reject ("pretermit") legally deficient asylum applications without a hearing. The memo indicates immigration judges "should take . . . all appropriate action to immediately resolve cases on their docket that do not have viable legal paths for relief or protection of removal," including through pretermission.

    Trump 2.0 [ID #1676]

    2025.04.11 EOIR PM 25-28 - Pretermission of Legally Insufficient Applications for Asylum
  2. Effective Date

    April 11, 2025
  3. Subsequent Trump and Court Action

    October 31, 2025

    2025.10.31 Interim Decision - Matter of C-I-G-M- & L-V-S-G-

    The Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) issued a precedent decision in Matter of C-I-G-M- & L-V-S-G- holding that asylum applications may be pretermitted when there is an ACA in place. The respondents are asylum seekers from Guatemala. DHS had filed a motion to pretermit the lead respondent's applications for asylum, withholding of removal, and protections under the Convention Against Torture, arguing that she is ineligible to apply for asylum and related relief because she may be removed to Honduras under the Honduras ACA.

    The BIA ruled that the ACA with Honduras bars the respondent's asylum application, and that the "Immigration Judge erred in determining that the ACA with Honduras does not apply to the respondent based solely on counsel's representations that the respondent fears being harmed there and generalized evidence of country conditions in Honduras." The BIA also ruled that the respondent is properly subject to the ACA with Honduras, even though the ACA was not implemented until after she filed for asylum in the United States.

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