New Department of Homeland Security Policy Permits Battered Women Asylum

The Department of Homeland Security has submitted a legal brief supporting asylum in some domestic abuse cases, reversing the position taken by the Bush administration.

The brief was published in the New York Times and it says abused women would be eligible for asylum if they can show their abusers treat them as subordinates and little better than property, the New York Times reports. They would have to show wide tolerance for domestic abuse in their home country and a lack of institutions there to protect them.

At issue in such cases is whether domestic abuse victims qualify for asylum under a requirement that they must demonstrate a well-founded fear of persecution because of “membership in a particular social group,” the Times says.

Read the New York Times article here.