Oasis Legal Services Condemns Senators for Risking the Safety of LGBTQ+ Immigrants and Asylum Seekers

February 5, 2024

Last night, after weeks of backdoor meetings, Sens. James Lankford, R-Okla., Chris Murphy, D-Conn., and Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., released the text of a bill that would dismantle our asylum system. We are raising an alarm, along with many other leading organizations, to protect our moral and legal obligations to help people fleeing for their lives. Oasis Legal Services urges Congress and the White House to reject this bill for what it is: an attempt to gain political points at the expense of people’s lives.

“LGBTQ+ asylum seekers and immigrants are among the most targeted and exploited, and this bill would create insurmountable obstacles for LGBTQ+ asylum seekers to present their case and find safety,” said Adam Ryan Chang, Executive Director of Oasis. “President Biden, the White House, and democratic Senators cannot claim to support the LGBTQ+ community if they support this bill. Protecting queer and trans lives includes keeping our asylum system intact so that the United States can welcome asylum seekers, like Oasis’ clients, who have experienced violent persecution based on their sexual orientation and gender identities,” he added.

We commend Senator Mazie Hirono, who, back in November 2023, remarked, “By making it harder for the most vulnerable to seek asylum, these changes would result in political dissenters and persecuted minorities being sent back to danger, and in some instances, to their death.” A couple weeks later, Senator Alex Padilla issued a joint statement with Representative Nanette Barragán, stating, “During his [President Biden’s] 2020 campaign he pledged to restore our nation’s ‘moral standing in the world and our historic role as a haven for refugees and asylum seekers.’ It is unconscionable that the President would consider going back on his word to enact what amounts to a ban on asylum.”

We believe it’s important to understand how the harmful policies contained in the bill would have a particularly negative impact on LGBTQ+ asylum seekers:

The bill provides over $3 billion for immigration enforcement, increasing funding for enough detention beds to ensure that tens of thousands of non-citizens are held in detention each day. Under this bill, more LGBTQ+ asylum seekers would be jailed simply for exercising their human right to be safe from transphobic and homophobic persecution. Trans and queer asylum seekers, as well as those living with HIV, are already experiencing dangerous and inhumane conditions in ICE detention centers, including sexual assault and a lack of access to HIV treatment and lifesaving gender-affirming care; this bill would subject more LGBTQ+ asylum seekers to being held in detention centers.
The bill would raise the legal standard for initial asylum screenings and formalize the third country asylum ban without any exception for LGBTQ+ asylum seekers who face heightened danger in the common transit countries on their journey to the United States. These countries – including, Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala – have long, documented histories of severe violence and torture of LGBTQ+ people.
The bill would close down the border to asylum seekers without any mechanism for hearing their claim, forcing queer and trans asylum seekers from all over the world to wait for indeterminate periods of time at the Mexican border. LGBTQ+ immigrants would be forced to suffer the same anti-LGBTQ+ violence that they sought to escape in their countries of origin.

Passing this bill is a death sentence to LGBTQ+ immigrants. Oasis urges humane solutions, including more safe legal pathways to migrate, expanded capacity at our border and within USCIS and EOIR (the Executive Office for Immigration Review) to fairly adjudicate asylum cases, and resources for local communities and organizations that support asylum seekers. We should never turn our backs on asylum seekers to further any political agenda. We should always stand for what is just, and not falter for the sake of political clout. We urge our lawmakers to stand with LGBTQ+ immigrants and challenge this harmful bill at every step of the way.

Here’s how to take action:

Call the Congressional Switchboard: (202) 224-3121
Ask to be transferred to Senator Butler’s office (or your Senators' office), and use the call script below.
Ask your friends and colleagues to take action too!

Call Script:

"Hello, My name is [NAME], and I am alarmed that [Senator NAME] is considering gutting asylum protections, expanding immigrant detention, and shutting the door on refugees.

I urge [Senator NAME] to VOTE NO on February 7 on the extreme and unworkable bill introduced by Senators Lankford, Murphy, and Sinema. I am counting on [Senator NAME] to oppose these anti-immigrant proposals, which will endanger refugees, separate families, and create more chaos and dysfunction at the border. Any anti-immigrant concession is unacceptable and a betrayal of our values as a country."