Disability Law United, together with Al Otro Lado and the Texas Civil Rights Project, filed a lawsuit against U.S. Customs and Border Protection over the agency’s failure to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request seeking its policies on making the CBP One app accessible to asylum seekers with disabilities.
CBP One is the mobile app asylum seekers are effectively required to use to schedule appointments to access the asylum process at the southern border. DLU, Al Otro Lado, the Texas Civil Rights Project, and the Young Center filed a FOIA request in March 2024 seeking CBP’s and ICE’s policies, directives, and memos on compliance with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, which requires federal agency technology to be accessible to people with disabilities, as it relates to the app. The request came amid widespread reports that asylum seekers with mental, physical, and communication disabilities have struggled to use CBP One, in some cases delaying their access to the asylum process by weeks or months. The FOIA request also put CBP and ICE on notice that they had failed to make related records publicly available, as required by law. The agencies did not respond within the 20-working-day deadline required by statute, and did not communicate any determination on the plaintiffs’ request for expedited processing.
The lawsuit asks the court to order CBP to search for and produce the requested records, to publish the disability-access and CBP One policies it is required to make publicly available, to rule on the plaintiffs’ request for expedited processing, and to award attorneys’ fees.
The case was resolved in the federal district court for Colorado.