USCIS no longer to interview many asylum applications

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services on Monday said it would begin referring many asylum applicants to immigration court without interviewing them, a move meant to speed up the resolution of immigration cases. In an effort to reduce a backlog of more than 2 million asylum cases, the agency said that after Sept. 26 it will begin automatically referring claims it considered to be non-meritorious—applicants it deemed public safety or national security threats—straight to immigration judges, according to a Federal Register entry set to publish on Tuesday. In the past, USCIS asylum officers have conducted interviews with every individual who applied for asylum.

What does this policy mean for asylum applicants? Immigration courts scrutinize asylum applications in a more adversarial manner than USCIS asylum officers do, the agency acknowledged in the Federal Register notice. Immigration judges processed a record number of cases last month—an all-time high they reached by increasing their removal orders, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse. Almost 80% of individuals appearing before immigration judges are currently receiving removal orders, TRAC reported. And many of the remaining individuals have opted to leave the country voluntarily rather than face deportation.

So are all asylum applicants now getting referred to immigration court immediately? No. USCIS explained that it would retain the ability to interview some asylum applicants when asylum officers find it appropriate. The agency said it would follow traditional procedures for handling those interviews when it decided to do so. The Federal Register notice indicated USCIS officers would still review asylum applications, but would not be required to interview all applicants.

What do immigration advocates say about the new rule? AfghanEvac, a nonprofit that advocates for the United States’ wartime allies from Afghanistan, said the rule would make it harder for Afghans to obtain protection from deportation back to their native country, now run by the Taliban. Many Afghans have complicated paperwork due to various policies enacted by the U.S. government, and without an interview, they lose a chance to explain the legitimacy of their case in person.

Jennie Murray, president and CEO of the National Immigration Forum, explained that the USCIS rule removed asylum applicants’ best opportunity to explain their case before they were placed into removal proceedings before an immigration judge. She suggested that the new rule might also increase, rather than decrease, the backlog of cases in immigration courts. USCIS acknowledged the rule could burden immigration courts in the short term, but said it expected that backlog to shrink over time.

Dig deeper: Read my report in Compassion about Haitian pastors who’ve urged many of their congregants to apply for asylum following the loss of Haiti’s temporary protected status.