A US appeals court ruled against an order President Donald Trump issued last month that denies asylum pleas of migrants who crossed the southern border illegally.
Two members of the three-judge bench of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals said late Friday that the ban is inconsistent with an existing US law, and attempts to over-run Congress.
A presidential order signed on November 9 says that the cases of asylum seekers who have crossed the border other than through a legal port of entry would not be heard. But a judge in San Francisco stayed the order until later this month, saying that the courts have an obligation to hear all asylum cases no matter whether people entered the country illegally or not.
Applying for asylum at a border post is a time-consuming process, and the migrants could be stuck for months or even years in shelters.
Thousands of Latin American migrants, who started their grueling journey on foot from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, have been impatiently waiting in shelter camps in the Mexican border city of Tijuana to cross the border hoping for a new life.
The migrants, who are mostly fleeing poverty, violence and persecution in Central America's "Northern Triangle", are determined to reach the U.S. hoping to build a better future for their families.
U.S. Border Patrol guards arrested about two dozen Central American migrants who scaled the border fence separating Mexico from the United States near Tijuana on Monday.
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