US President Joe Biden has announced a sweeping new executive action aimed at curbing migrant arrivals at the US-Mexico border
It will stop migrants who cross unlawfully from receiving asylum, but only takes effect when the southern border has been "overwhelmed"
The Biden Administration says the action makes it easier for immigration officers to remove people who are in the US illegally
The White House says the action will pause when the number of migrants crossing the border slows to a "safe" and "manageable" level
Trump's campaign team have criticised Biden's action, and a migrant advocate group flagged it will challenge the new policies in court
Immigration is one of the key voter issues ahead of November's presidential election, and both Democrats and Republicans are seeking to prove their credentials on the topic
President Biden has now stopped speaking at the White House.
Stick with us as we continue to bring you more lines from his statement, along with reactions and everything else you need to know about US immigration.
Image source, US PoolPresident Joe Biden continues by saying: "this action will help us gain control of our border".
Biden doesn't give a number of crossings that will trigger the action to stop, but say that would happen when entries drop to a level that can be effectively managed.
The White House statement earlier today also used similar language, saying the executive action would be in place as long as illegal crossings on the southern border was "overwhelmed".
Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from Washington
Biden announces ban on migrants crossing border unlawfully
President Joe Biden began his remarks with pointed criticism of Republicans - whom the White House has repeatedly blamed for the collapse of a bipartisan border deal.
The crumbled deal included many of the measures that have now been announced as part of the new White House executive actions.
Specifically, Biden blamed Donald Trump - who had publicly pressured Republican lawmakers to oppose the deal.
"Donald Trump told them to," Biden said. "He didn't want to fix the issue. He wanted to use it to attack me."
"An extremely cynical political move... and a complete disservice to the American people," he added.
Stay with us for more updates.
US President Joe Biden is now speaking.
He starts by referring to Republicans in Congress who walked away from a border deal earlier this year. We will bring you more updates on this shortly.
A reminder that you can watch live by pressing the play button at the top of this page.
We are about to hear US President Joe Biden give an update on border security.
You can watch it live by pressing the play button at the top of this page.
We will also bring you text updates.
Stay with us.
Will Grant
Reporting from Mexico City
Image source, Getty ImagesIn his morning press briefing, the Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador was unsurprisingly quizzed about the latest development on cross-border immigration by the Biden Administration.
López Obrador would be speaking to his US counterpart “probably today” – a sign of how pressing the matter is generally considered between the two neighbours.
In fact, in recent years, the issue of migration is arguably only surpassed by trade in terms of its importance in current Mexico-US relations.
López Obrador was again at pains to stress that the relationship with Joe Biden is good, including on issues of migration, and that more needs to be done to address the root causes of migration in Central America.
On that latter point, he has banged the same drum now for almost six years as President with precious little progress on any kind of development aid or job creation programmes in Latin America that can genuinely be said to have dissuaded people from attempting to travel north.
In fact, for many analysts, the main legacy of his outgoing presidency with regards to migration has been the crackdown by migration agents and security forces at Mexico’s southern border to stop people from making their way across Mexican territory towards the border with the US.
In that sense, the idea that a harder line from the Biden Administration might put people off from trying could be welcomed – albeit not publicly – by the president-elect, Claudia Sheinbaum.
If there is one thing she will not want to inherit from her political mentor when she takes over in October, it’s the headache of politically charged migration issues with Washington.
Most feel that it’s unlikely she will be able to avoid it for long, however.
Anthony Zurcher
BBC North America correspondent
Any action taken by a president running for re-election will instantly be viewed through the prism of campaign politics.
Biden’s immigration announcement, coming just months before November’s balloting and weeks before the first presidential debate, is no different.
With his decision to impose new restrictions on those seeking asylum in the US, the president’s team appears to be making the calculation that the political benefits of doing something to address the surge of migrants at the US-Mexico border outweighs the risks.
The move has been quickly condemned by pro-immigration activists on the left and is sure to be challenged in court. While these steps will never win over Republicans, the Biden team may be hoping they could help assuage concerns among some moderate voters that the president understands the scope of the problem.
Behind all of this is the calculation that, with an outspokenly anti-immigration Donald Trump as his opponent, Biden’s left flank will ultimately stick with him. And in a close election, winning over even a handful of voters in the middle could be the difference between victory and defeat.
Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from Washington
The White House is already bracing for legal challenges to these new US immigration executive actions.
Speaking to reporters ahead of the announcement, senior administration officials said they fully expect to face legal challenges from both ends of the political spectrum.
The challenges are likely to come from both immigration advocates and Republican-led states that are highly critical of President Joe Biden's handling of the southern border.
Already, the American Civil Liberties Union, or ACLU, has announced plans to challenge the new policies in court.
In a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, the ACLU said it believes the new executive actions "severely restrict people's legal right to seek asylum, putting tens of thousands of lives at risk".
"This action takes the same approach as the Trump administration's asylum ban. We will be challenging this order in court."
Connecticut Democratic Senator Chis Murphy was quoted by Straight Arrow News as saying he is unsure if the executive actions will survive legal challenges.
“I have been pretty doubtful from the beginning that the President has the legal authority to make the big changes at the border necessary to get the border under control," he was quoted as saying.
Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from Washington
Image source, ReutersA key message from Donald Trump when he was president, even if it never became a reality, was that the US must build a border wall and increase deportations.
The headlines created by the separation of children from their detained parents, decried by many as cruel, added to the impression that the US was closing its border.
Under President Biden, both tone and policy changed. Deportations fell and "deterrent-focused" policies such as the rapid removal of migrants to Mexico and the push for a border wall ended.
Migrants were paroled into the US to await immigration court dates - a process which can often take years.
People trying to cross the border during this time told the BBC they thought that entering and staying in the US was going to be easier. And human smugglers took advantage of a change in presidency to create a sense of urgency among migrants that they should hurry to the border.
"Part of it is that they think they can just come. I think that's just what they're being told," said Alex Cuic, an immigration lawyer and professor at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio.
Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from Washington
Some immigration activists have already criticised this move by the Biden Administration.
"It’s unfortunate that politics are driving the immigration conversation in an increasingly restrictive direction," said Jennie Murray, president and the CEO of the National Immigration Forum.
"While there’s no question the US needs to better address challenges at the border, the use of (section) 212(f) (of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act) authority is concerning," she added.
Guerline Jozef, Executive Director of Haitian Bridge Alliance - which works with Haitian migrants at the border - called the announcement "a direct assault on the fundamental human right to seek asylum".
"This Trump-era policy will leave thousands of vulnerable individuals, including families, children, and those fleeing violence and persecution, without the protection and refuge they need," Jozef added.
Lisa Lambert
US reporter
Image source, ReutersThis action from Biden is not a shock to anyone. It has been expected for a while and last week some details started filtering out. So, it may not be surprising that the Trump campaign already commented before it was officially announced.
On Tuesday morning, the campaign’s press secretary Karoline Leavitt put out a six-sentence statement. It claimed the order “is for amnesty, not border security”.
The statement accused the Biden administration of wanting to release detained migrants “as quickly as possible” and “giving a green light” to human traffickers. And it said Biden does not want to truly shut down the border because he is beholden to “radical left Democrats”.
Much of the statement was against migrants themselves, casting them as violent criminals. That’s been a common theme in Trump’s presidential campaigning.
And this is the second time this year Trump and Biden will square off over immigration.
Earlier this year, Trump helped kill legislation in Congress that would have carried out many reforms Biden, Democrats and some Republicans had wanted. Back then, Trump said only a “fool” would vote to pass it.
Biden claimed the former president had pressured lawmakers to torpedo the bill “because Donald Trump thinks it's bad for him politically”.
Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from Washington
Image source, Getty ImagesIn addition to changes to asylum and the introduction of a threshold at the border, the White House announcement is also aimed at speeding up immigration processes in overburdened immigration courts - which can often take years.
According to the White House, the justice department and Department of Homeland Security, or DHS, have launched a new "recent arrivals docket" to more quickly resolve cases in which migrants are detained crossing into the US unlawfully between ports of entry.
The new process, the White House added, will allow cases to be heard faster.
Those "who do not have a legal basis to remain" in the US will be "quickly" removed, while the US will "grant protection" to those with valid claims.
Historically, many migrants apprehended at the border are released on parole while they await immigration court dates - a process which in some cases can take years and has been highly criticised by Republicans.
A few moments ago, the White House announced a new executive action to "secure the border".
So what does it say?
We are expecting US President Joe Biden to speak about this order later today.
And you can read the order in full here, external.
Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from Washington
I’ve been following the US-Mexico border for years and through multiple administrations, and while some aspects of it have remained constant, there has been a noticeable shift during the Biden administration.
More than 6.4 million migrants have been detained crossing into the US illegally under Biden, a higher number than under Trump, Obama or George W Bush. There has been a significant decline in crossings in recent months, that is likely only temporary.
The reasons for the Biden-era spike are complex, with some factors pre-dating this government and beyond the control of the US. Experts point to three top reasons.
Tom Bateman
BBC News
The immigration issue is a growing threat to US President Joe Biden's re-election hopes.
Along with the economy, it is a dominant concern for voters in most polls – and the vast majority disapproves of Biden’s handing of it.
Driven by growing conflict or instability in their home countries and drawn by the post-pandemic jobs gap in the US, immigrants have crossed the southern border at unprecedented numbers over the last three years.
Those numbers began to rise in 2018, as Central Americans fled a series of complex crises, and then fell drastically in 2020 thanks to pandemic-era restrictions. They began climbing again starting in 2021.
More than 6.4 million migrants have been detained while crossing into the US illegally during the Biden administration. Many of them are released into the United States to await processing, which sometimes takes years.
In 2023 US Custom and Border Protection (CBP) recorded a record high of nearly 2.5 million "encounters" at the southern border - with 302,000 of them in December alone.
Since then, migrant arrivals have plummeted, with recently released CBP statistics showing there were only about 179,000 migrant "encounters" recorded in April.
Experts warn, however, that this slower rate is not sustainable.
Caitlin Wilson
US reporter
Hello, and welcome to our coverage of US President Joe Biden’s announcement of executive action aimed at curbing illegal migration, which has hit record numbers in recent years.
The new policy will limit the amount of people able to enter the US, and request asylum.
Immigration is a flashpoint topic ahead of November’s presidential election, with both Democrats and Republicans seeking to score political points on the issue.
“These actions will be in effect when high levels of encounters at the Southern Border exceed our ability to deliver timely consequences, as is the case today,” the White House said in its announcement statement.
It also clarified, “these actions are not permanent”.
The new policy will be “discontinued when the number of migrants who cross the border between ports of entry is low enough for America’s system to safely and effectively manage border operations,” the White House said.
Stay with us as we bring you all the information you need to understand this development and the state of immigration in the US.