Last week, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) finalized a regulation that bans so-called “public charges” from obtaining legal status in the United States. The finalized public charge rule, the Cato Institute argues, redefines the “historic meaning” of the term “public charge,” which will likely result in the denial of immigrant and nonimmigrant applications based on “a bureaucrat’s suspicions that they could use welfare.”
Read moreUSCIS: “United States Citizenship and Immigration Services Will Adjust International Footprint to Seven Locations.”
US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will close thirteen international field offices and three district offices between now and August 2020, according to an announcement on August 9, 2019. While eliminating these thirteen international offices, USCIS also announced plans to maintain operations at international field offices in Beijing and Guangzhou, China; Nairobi, Kenya; and New Delhi, India, as well as Guatemala City, Guatemala; Mexico City, Mexico; and San Salvador, El Salvador, “as part of a whole-of-government approach to address the crisis at the southern border.”
Read moreSojourners: “Policymakers Aim To Address 900,000-Person Green Card Backlog.”
The House of Representatives recently passed a measure that would end country-based caps to significantly increase the number of green card holders from certain nations. This proposal, now sent to the Senate, was one of several in Congress competing to address the backlog of more than 900,000 approved employment-based green card applications. Under the measures proposed by Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Fla) and by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), the visas would be awarded on a first-come first-served basis, many of which would go to Indian and Chinese nationals.
Read moreForbes: “Congress Asks USCIS To Explain Immigration Delays And Denials.”
Congress raised concerns about the rising delays and unjustified denials of various visa types at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS), during a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing on July 16, 2019. Representative Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), chair of the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Immigration and Citizenship, specifically highlighted inefficiencies regarding changes in processing, noting their impact on students experiencing significant delays for Optical Practical Training (OPT).
Read moreThe Washington Post: “FBI, ICE find state driver’s license photos are a gold mine for facial-recognition searches.”
Federal Bureau of Investigation and Immigration Customs Enforcement agents use state department of motor vehicle databases for facial-recognition purposes, reveal newly released documents. These records, obtained by researchers with Georgetown Law’s Center on Privacy and Technology and shared with The Washington Post, contain thousands of facial-recognition requests, internal documents, and emails over the past five years.The Washington Post reports that “DMV records contain the photos of a vast majority of a state’s residents, most of whom have never been charged with a crime,” affecting millions of Americans whose photos are being used without their knowledge. Lawmakers across the aisle have criticized the technology as a “dangerous, pervasive and error-prone surveillance tool.”
Read moreNewsweek: “Naturalized U.S. Judge Officiates Naturalization Ceremony For 350 People In Texas Border Town.”
On June 2, 2019, Marina Garcia Marmolejo, a district judge for the US Southern District, presided over a naturalization ceremony for 350 people who became citizens in Laredo, a Texas border town. The ceremony was one of 110 ceremonies nationwide that combined saw about 7,500 new citizens take their oaths.
Read moreThe Washington Post: "US immigration agency to transfer citizenship paperwork from busy offices, hoping to reduce wait times."
Earlier this year in February, eighty-six members of the House of Representatives sent a letter to US Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) that demanded accountability for the agency’s increasingly lengthy processing delays. Now, USCIS is looking to transfer cases out of overburdened offices to even out processing times across the country. The strategy, however, will only apply to applications for permanent residency (green cards) and applications for naturalization (citizenship).
Read moreThe Atlantic: This Is Exactly What Privacy Experts Said Would Happen
According to a statement that the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agency released last week, photos of travelers and their vehicle license plates snapped at a US border control point have been hacked. In an email statement to journalists, CBP confirmed that an undisclosed subcontractor transferred copies of license plates and travelers’ photos from federal servers to its own company network without CPB’s authorization. CBP reports that its own servers were unharmed by any cyber attack.
Read moreThe New York Times: “U.S. Requiring Social Media Information From Visa Applicants”
A State Department policy effective May 31, 2019, now requires visa applicants to the United States to submit information about social media accounts they have used in the past five years. The account information requested would give the government access to photos, locations, dates of birth, dates of milestones, and other personal data commonly shared on social media.
Read moreThe Washington Post: “How a flight attendant from Texas ended up in an ICE detention center for six weeks.”
DACA beneficiary Selene Saavedra Roman from Peru, who has lived in the US for twenty-five years and is a flight attendant for Mesa Airlines, was detained shortly after she landed in Houston on a return flight from Mexico in February. Saavedra Roman remained in custody for six weeks and was released last Friday, but advocates are pointing to her case as an example of how the Trump administration’s attempts to end DACA continue to confuse program beneficiaries, their families, government agencies, and private employers.
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