White House Will Appeal Ruling Against Returning Asylum Seekers To Mexico

The White House said in a statement on Tuesday it would appeal a court ruling made one day earlier that halted an administration policy that required some asylum seekers to return to Mexico and wait there for their cases to proceed.

The ruling is slated to take effect on Friday, according to the order by U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg in San Francisco. The preliminary injunction will apply nationwide.

The program was launched in January and was one of many policies aimed at slowing rising numbers of immigrants arriving at the border, many of them families from Central America, that swelled last month to the highest in a decade.

Because of limits on how long children are legally allowed to be held in detention, many of the families are released to await U.S. immigration court hearings, a process that can take years because of ballooning backlogs.