This week, the Vera Institute of Justice learned that the Biden administration wants to expand certain legal orientation programs and legal services it administers via government contracts to assist people who will be expelled by the reinstated Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP).

Kica Matos, vice president of strategic initiatives at the Vera institute of Justice, issued the following statement:

There is no way to make an unlawful, inhumane, and dangerous policy workable. Despite the government's attempts to sanitize MPP by expanding legal orientation programs and offering additional legal services, no amount of money, time, or lawyers can improve a policy that violates U.S. refugee laws, treaty obligations, or the due process rights of asylum seekers. Especially when it forces people fleeing violence, persecution, and death to remain in places where they face similar harms. If the Biden-Harris administration is serious about addressing our system’s cruelty and cares about people’s lives, then it must end these anti-asylum policies, dismantle civil detention, and invest those resources in a federal defender program, an independent judiciary, and programs that keep families together and communities safe.