A newly announced review of green card and other immigration applications by US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is expected to cause massive delays and place a substantial strain on the agency’s resources, according to a former senior official.
The decision for this comprehensive review was outlined in a USCIS memo this month and follows a recent high-profile shooting in Washington, D.C. The attack resulted in the death of West Virginia National Guard Specialist Sarah Beckstrom and the wounding of Air National Guard Andrew Wolfe. The shooter, an Afghan national named Rahmanullah Lakanwal, was taken into custody after being shot by another Guard member.
Strain on Resources and Backlog Effect
Ricky Murray, who served as the Chief of Staff of Refugee and International Operations at USCIS until November 29, told Newsweek that the scope of this new vetting effort is unprecedented.
USCIS is currently handling a record 11.3 million pending applications, the highest number in its history. Murray warned that the re-review will severely exacerbate this backlog:
“This is going to have a tremendous effect on the backlog. Having to pull resources together to review hundreds of thousands of cases is going to require thousands of man-hours. These man-hours are only going to be taken from processing of new filings,” Murray said.
“There are finite resources. You can expect to see significant delays in the processing of any new forms in the area that USCIS steals the resources from to do this re-review.”
Targeting High-Risk Countries
The new review targets pending applications from people with adjusted status and from countries classified as “high risk” by the agency. The pause on decisions affects individuals from as many as 19 countries that were previously subject to travel restrictions, including:
- Afghanistan
- Cuba
- Eritrea
- Haiti
- Iran
- Libya
- Somalia
- Sudan
- Venezuela
Immigrants from these nations can expect delays for a wide range of benefits, including green cards, work permits, travel documents, visa extensions, and even naturalization ceremonies, regardless of whether they have already completed their standard vetting processes.
Policy Justification and Expert Concerns
USCIS cited the shooting of the National Guard members as the reason for the pause, stating the measure is necessary to ensure that individuals receiving immigration benefits do not pose a national security risk.
USCIS Director Joseph Edlow emphasized this priority in a statement after the attack: “My primary responsibility is to ensure that every alien is vetted and screened to the maximum degree possible.”
However, Murray argued that using this single event to halt applications for thousands of immigrants, most of whom have no connection to the incident, is highly unusual:
“The memo is unique in that it is using a single event to call into question the validity of the benefits of thousands of immigrants, almost all who have nothing to do with this isolated event… Even a very limited number of Afghans have ever even had contact with the perpetrator of the heinous event spurring this release of this memo,” he noted.
Murray described the effort as a “needle-in-the-haystack search” and warned that it is “a tremendous drain on already scarce resources at USCIS, with a limited probability of success in reaching the stated goal.”
Attorneys have already reported that applicants from the affected countries have had interviews for their final naturalization or adjustment of status applications cancelled or delayed. The memo urges field offices to prioritize the review of pending applications while continuing routine processing “as resources allow,” a balance that experts believe will be difficult to maintain.