[News reports](https://www.vox.com/2018/11/28/18089048/border-asylum-trump-metering-legally-ports) say that Trump administration is limiting the number of asylum seeking immigrants to 20 per day in a process called metering. 

What I don't understand is why this is such a low number, considering that it creates a huge backup of those seeking to legally migrate. The consequence of those huge backups is that those seeking to legally enter inevitably consider entering illegally. 

To put this in context (for me personally), my grandmother immigrated to the US in 1905 through one of the several ports of entry (in her case, Ellis Island). She was inspected and interrogated to determine if she qualified for admittance in accordance with the laws. During 1905 to 1914 Immigration officials reviewed about 5,000 immigrants **per day** during peak times at Ellis Island. In fact it is reported that Immigration officials processed over 11,000 persons on April 17 1907 at Ellis Island alone.

So why is the administration unable to process many many more than 20 per day?

BTW, I like to imagine that my grandmother's admission to the US helped, in some small way,to make America great.