Tears and disappointment flowed Monday after newly sworn-in President Donald Trump removed a mobile app that allows migrants to apply to legally enter the United States as asylum seekers. All pending appointments made with the app have also been canceled.
The CBP One app was created under the Biden administration to prevent people who cross the southwest border illegally from seeking asylum. Once it took effect, it was the only way people could get an appointment to apply for asylum.
On Monday afternoon, Customs and Border Protection posted on its website that the app was no longer available for this purpose and that “existing appointments have been canceled.” As of January 7, some 280,000 people were logging into the app daily to get an appointment, according to Reuters.
In Juárez, Mexico, a woman screamed, “Oh my God!” as she wailed against a post near the border fence, Noticias Telemundo reported.
Another migrant, Julio Alberto Hernández, originally from El Salvador and waiting in Tijuana, told Noticias Telemundo that his appointment was in three or four days.
“I was so happy because I was going to be able to come in to provide for my children,” Hernández said in Spanish. “But with this, we are sad because they erased it.”
The news was delivered to CBP One users via pop-up notifications in different languages stating that CBP One appointments “are no longer valid.” CBP said that as of December, it processed about 44,000 asylum seekers using information submitted through the app. From January 2023 to December 2024, more than 936,500 people had made appointments, CBP said.
Trump had already telegraphed his intention to end migrants’ use of the app. The Biden administration said the app helped set up a chaotic asylum process, marked by many people crossing the border illegally and surrendering to Border Patrol agents.
But the app has also been criticized for technical problems and the long wait for initial checks to determine whether migrants were qualified to seek asylum. Trump and others also didn’t like the number of people allowed in.
Christian Martinez, from Honduras, said he sent an application and just received a response saying applications were no longer being accepted.
“Right now, I feel like something just disappeared. That hope of being able to enter legally has been cut short and it’s very difficult,” Martinez said.
The wait lasted a year and a half for Melanie Mendoza, who called the cancellations unfair. “Now they’re telling us, ‘No, your appointments are not valid,'” she said, wiping away tears.
In Matamoros, Mexico, a group of migrants from the central Mexican state of Zacatecas arrived at a legal border crossing at midday, but were turned away by border authorities who said all appointments were now zero, they told Reuters.
Honduran Denia Mendez, sitting in the courtyard of a migrant shelter in Piedras Negras, Mexico – across from Eagle Pass, Texas – stared at an email for several minutes, before her eyes welled up. tears.
“They canceled my appointment,” she said.
Kayla McCormick contributed.
