GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - In light of the recent controversy pertaining to immigration across the U.S. border, President Donald Trump signed an executive order Wednesday ending the process of separating children from their families after illegal crossings.
Given all of the information out there, we try to make sense of what exactly is happening in our world.
Asylum seeker and refugee are often terms used synonymously, but there are important distinctions between the two. “Asylum seekers are people who arrive at the border seeking refugee status, refugee status is defined by the 1951 Convention on Refugees,” said Joel Westra, a political science professor at Calvin College.
That treaty establishes who a refugee is. "A person who has a well founded fear of persecution based on their race, religion, nationality, social group or political opinion," Westra said. "So if a person has that well-founded fear of persecution, that person then can have a status as a refugee granted, that entails political and economic rights, including eventual naturalization.”
While asylum seekers and refugees are both a type of immigrant, their experiences are vastly different at the border. Refugees are given basic rights. “Which include, right to schooling, certain housing support and so forth,” Westra said.
That's not the case when someone arrives as an asylum seeker. “In the present the Trump Administration has instituted a 'zero tolerance' policy, and it’s where those who cross the border will be charged with a misdemeanor of illegal crossing unless they have that refugee status granted to them by the courts,” Westra said.
Asylum seekers are the immigrants being charged, and who were previously separated from their children, while they were being put into the system to be tried.
If they are not granted refugee status, they are usually deported.
There is a simple way to remember all this. Until immigrants are given refugee status, they are considered asylum seekers.
Some might think asylum seekers should just apply for refugee status before they get to the border, but for many of them, that’s just not a practical option.
That’s because they're often desperate to flee a potentially dangerous situation and do not understand the legal rules that relate to their actions.