The Biden administration is considering making it more difficult to remove his newest restrictions on asylum, reports Hamed Aleaziz of The New York Times.  

Currently, restrictions would lift if the daily average of unauthorized border crossings falls below 1,500 for a full week. The administration is looking at extending that period to several weeks, Aleaziz highlights. 

Separately, a federal district judge in Texas extended the pause on the Biden administration’s "Keeping Families Together" program, reports Ted Hesson of Reuters. The stay now will continue through at least Sept. 23, allowing for "legal briefing and a possible hearing."  

Earlier yesterday, the Department of Homeland Security filed a motion to end the stay, arguing that the district court lacked authority to issue it, Andrew Kreighbaum of Bloomberg Law reports. 

Keeping Families Together would allow many citizenship-eligible undocumented spouses and stepchildren of U.S. citizens to apply without leaving the country and risking a years-long bar on re-entry. Read more in our explainer.  

Meanwhile, other separated spouses are watching the program closely, reports Christina Morales of The New York Times. Laura Araujo’s husband was denied a green card in 2013, then deported after twice crossing the border illegally. 

"I hope that these sad tears one day turn into happy ones," said Alberto Araujo Rodríguez, Laura’s husband, whose family recently visited him at his home in Canada. "It breaks my heart when I see my children like that. They need their father." 

Welcome to Thursday’s edition of The Forum Daily. I’m Dan Gordon, the Forum’s strategic communications VP, and the great Forum Daily team also includes Jillian Clark, Darika Verdugo and Clara Villatoro. If you have a story to share from your own community, please send it to me at [email protected]. 

WIN-WIN — According to a new study from the American Immigration Council and the city of Dallas, immigrants there contributed about $1 billion in state and local taxes and billions more in spending power, reports Abraham Nudelstejer of The Dallas Morning News. Meanwhile, in his Washington Post column, Eduardo Porter writes that immigration is not a zero-sum game but a win-win economic opportunity. Painting it as the former "could cause untold damage to American society," he writes. 

PLANS — Alicia Bárcena, Mexico’s foreign affairs secretary will present the "Mexican Model of Human Mobility" plan before she leaves her current office to serve under President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum, reports Beatriz Guillén of El País. The plan lays out the next few years in migration policy for Mexico. Bárcena notes that the plan takes regional migration challenges into account. "We did so with a very clear compass: humanize mobility," she said. "The migrant is a person seeking opportunities for a better life." 

TRANSLATIONS NEEDED — A Cardozo School of Law report published last week indicates that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is not providing sufficient translation services to detainees in its facilities, breaking its own rules and federal law, reports Andrea Castillo of the Los Angeles Times. Detainees' main complaints included being unable to ask for medical care and having to rely on other detainees for the translation of sensitive documents.  

FLIP THE SCRIPT — Restrictive immigration laws empower cartels and endanger migrants, Agustina Vergara Cid and Onkar Ghate write in New Ideal. "The reality is that too many peaceful, willing-to-work migrants who seek to come here legally — can’t," they write. "This is what creates the prey for the predators." More legal-immigration pathways, combined with a crackdown on cartels, would help, they emphasize.  

Thanks for reading,  

Dan 

P.S. Political and human realities of the border and migration are the focus of artist Marcos "Erre" Ramirez’s exhibit in San Ysidro, California, reports Salvador Rivera of Border Report. See what you think!