Watchdog pans immigrant visa program
Agency accused of ineffective management and opening the door to possibility of fraud
The Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General found that the U visa program, created to protect immigrant crime victims, is “not managed effectively and is susceptible to fraud,” according to a redacted report made public this month.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services runs the U visa program, which was sharply criticized by the oversight division.
The report found Citizenship and Immigration Services approved paperwork that had been “forged, unauthorized, altered or suspicious.” The agency also didn't track the outcomes of fraud referrals, which the inspector general argued could discourage the reporting of fraud.
U visas are a critical tool used by law enforcement in Houston and across the country to encourage immigrants to cooperate with police when they are victims of a serious crime. The visas are used to protect immigrants from being deported in exchange for their cooperation in a criminal investigation.
In November 2020, the Harris County Commissioners Court voted to dedicate $500,000 to help immigrants in Houston secure U visas. And last October, commissioners established best practices to guide local law enforcement on how to certify that an immigrant victim of a crime is helpful to an investigation.
The report also stated that Citizenship and Immigration Services failed to create agency performance goals that could be quantified and measured. It even found that the agency may not be accurately counting the number of U
visas granted.
Per federal law established by Congress, the agency can grant only 10,000 visas per fiscal year. The cap has caused a significant backlog of more than 270,000 petitions pending a final adjudication.
“A victim petitioning in 2021 will likely wait 10 years or longer to receive a U visa,” the report stated.
Though the cap plays a major role in these long delays, Citizenship and Immigration Services officials said they also face a backlog when they are at the beginning of the process, when the cap doesn’t apply.
The inspector general recommended that Citizenship and Immigration Services improve fraud mitigation controls and data reporting, start tracking fraud referrals, address the U visa initial petition backlog and improve overall performance metrics.
In their official response, Citizenship and Immigration Services officials argued that they did have adequate fraud controls and that following up on the outcome of fraud referrals is outside the agency’s scope. They agreed on the other recommendations and have already taken some steps to address those critiques.