Trump administration rule could pause work permits for asylum applicants for 'many years'

By Ted Hesson

WASHINGTON, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Work permits for asylum applicants could be paused for 'many years' under a proposed rule published by U.S. President Donald Trump's administration on Friday, in what would be one of the most sweeping changes to asylum-seeker employment authorization in decades.

The proposed rule, issued by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, seeks to reduce incentives for migrants to file asylum applications to gain legal work authorization and aims to lower the processing workload to increase security checks.

The proposed change - which will likely face legal challenges - is part of a broader Trump administration effort to reduce both legal and illegal immigration. Trump, a Republican, returned to office in 2025 after a campaign that widely portrayed immigrants and asylum seekers as criminals and economic drains on U.S. communities despite evidence contradicting those claims.

The new DHS proposal would pause processing of work permits for all new asylum applicants until average processing times for certain asylum applications reach 180 days or lower. Based on current wait times, DHS estimated it could take between 14 to 173 years to reach the level to resume the processing, but stressed that other factors could shorten the timeline.

The Trump administration also proposed creating more restrictive eligibility criteria for asylum-based work permits, arguing that a work permit "is not an entitlement" and is issued at the discretion of the DHS secretary.

Most notably, the regulation would generally bar migrants who entered the U.S. illegally from receiving new work permits or renewing existing ones. The restriction would have limited exceptions for people who notified U.S. border authorities within 48 hours of entering that they had a fear of persecution or torture or another urgent reason causing them to cross illegally.

Immigrant advocates and some Democrats have criticized Trump's hardline approach to asylum seekers, saying it undermines existing U.S. and international law.