Given the scale of admissions and the extent of programmatic changes in the refugee resettlement program implemented during the Biden years, key questions arise:
- Could some individuals have been wrongly approved – including cases involving fraud?
- Were all applicants properly screened?
- And, most critically, could any admitted refugee pose risks to public safety or national security?
The Trump administration is reportedly preparing to reinterview refugees resettled during the Biden-Harris administration and may halt all refugee green card approvals. Even though he wasn’t resettled through the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP), the attack on National Guard soldiers by an Afghan brought here during the Biden years makes the reinterview initiative all the more urgent.
More than 233,000 refugees were resettled through USRAP during the Biden-Harris years. The prior administration not only increased admissions at an accelerated pace; it also expanded and restructured USRAP – prioritizing admissions from Latin America, broadening NGO referral authority to nominate applicants, and launching private sponsorship pathways that allowed U.S. residents (including newly arrived refugees) to pick those who get to follow them here.
The secretary of Homeland Security has delegated to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) the authority to determine eligibility for refugee status under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) – refugee determinations under the INA are “entirely discretionary”.
USCIS also possesses full statutory authority to revoke refugee status and deny adjustment of status. Refugees whose status is revoked or whose green card applications are denied generally have no right of administrative appeal within USCIS, though they may still seek review before an immigration judge after they are placed in removal proceedings.
The resettlement adjudication process – from the referral to USRAP, to assistance and pre-screening by Resettlement Support Centers (RSCs), through multilayered security vetting, adjudication by a USCIS refugee officer, and ultimately admission to the United States – was far from flawless, particularly under the prior administration. Each stage contained vulnerabilities and discretionary gaps that merit careful reassessment.
Targeting the “Most Vulnerable”?
The Trump administration’s potential reassessment of cases of resettled refugees has drawn strong criticism with some framing the effort as an attempt to target “one of the world’s most vulnerable populations”. But were all those admitted under the Biden-Harris administration most in need of protection? The fact is, many of those resettled in recent years were not the most at risk and “in need of saving.” Here’s why.
The prior administration prioritized resettlement from Latin America as a part of an effort to deter illegal border crossings; in other words, offering refugee resettlement as an alternative to coming here illegally. Others, in different regions of the world, needed these resettlement spots more urgently.
It encouraged NGO referrals to USRAP which could have enticed fraudulent actions – NGO staff appraisals can be at best complaisant and at worst open to the highest bidder as resettlement places, by UNHCR’s own admission, are “valuable commodities” making the resettlement process “a target for abuse.”
It changed the essence of resettlement itself, which has always been presented as a “life-saving” endeavor. It launched the “Welcome Corps”, a private sponsorship program within USRAP, not to resettle the most vulnerable, but rather to privilege those who happen to have friends or family who made it here before them.
It opened the door to non-refugees to be picked for resettlement by private sponsors. Anyone could be sponsored for resettlement under the Welcome Corps, including asylum seekers or applicants for “parole”. Sponsored individuals did not need to actually be refugees according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Refugee Status Determination, let alone in that subset of refugees determined by the UN to be in “need of resettlement”. Moreover, exemptions were offered to clear applicants from any form of registration documentation. USCIS was left to determine eligibility for refugee status after review of the cases (prepared by an NGO or international organization funded by the U.S. government) and a one-time interview with the applicant.
In short: Under the Biden-Harris administration, one did not need to be a refugee to be sponsored for refugee resettlement, but could simply claim persecution and become one in order to be admitted.
Resettlement Adjudication Process under the Biden-Harris Administration
When an individual abroad is referred for refugee resettlement in the United States, the case is first received and processed by a Resettlement Support Center (RSC), a non-governmental or international organization under cooperative agreement with the Department of State.
Here’s a brief sequence of the general adjudication process under the Biden-Harris administration:
- Referral to an RSC by UNHCR, a U.S. embassy, a senior U.S. government official granted referral authority, a designated NGO or a group of private sponsors of an applicant they know (traditionally, the United States chose the refugees it resettles almost solely based on referrals from UNHCR based on vulnerability and eligibility assessment);
- RSC staff conduct a prescreening interview with the resettlement applicant, initiate biographic checks, enter case in the system, etc.;
- A USCIS refugee officer (member of the “Refugee Corps”) reviews checks, collects biometrics, conducts eligibility interview with the applicant during a circuit ride (a trip organized to interview numerous refugee applicants abroad);
- A USCIS refugee officer adjudicates Form I-590 (Registration for Classification as Refugee), after reviewing admissibility and eligibility for refugee classification;
- RSC processes approved cases for travel, including medical exams and cultural orientation.
The Role of the Refugee Corps
USCIS formed the Refugee Corps within the Refugee, Asylum and International Operations Directorate (RAIO) in 2005 to adjudicate applications for refugee status overseas and determine whether refugee applicants are eligible for resettlement in the United States.
The Refugee Corps is composed of specially trained officers who spend most of their time in international refugee processing locations interviewing resettlement applicants and adjudicating refugee claims.
No educational requirement is needed to become a refugee officer but one must attend a mandatory training course. Training (conducted virtually or in-person) can last up to 12 weeks. A residential paid basic immigration officer training program (an approximately six-week course at a USCIS training facility) may also be required.
The refugee officer position requires frequent travel, including circuit rides to international locations that usually last between 45 and 60 days. Some locations “may be physically challenging and may involve working in inhospitable climates, in remote camp settings, or in environments of high security”. Working conditions may be very demanding, involving “extreme temperatures, harsh working environments, austere living facilities, and long arduous travel”.
As part of expanding the U.S. Refugee Resettlement program, the Biden-Harris administration hired more than 300 refugee officers. It more than tripled the size of the refugee officer corps allowing for additional interviews: “In the first half of 2024 alone, these refugee officers [481 of them in FY24] interviewed more than 80,000 refugee applicants overseas.”
The Role of RSCs
The State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (PRM) funded and managed seven RSCs abroad, operated by international and non-governmental organizations.
Three of these RSCs — Church World Service, International Rescue Committee, and Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society — were also “resettlement agencies” that were funded by the State Department to receive, place, and assist refugees inside the United States, creating a possible conflict of interest.
The role of RSCs in the application and case processing of potential refugees under the USRAP was crucial.
Under PRM’s guidance, RSCs collected biographic and other information from the applicants to prepare cases for security screening, interview, and adjudication by USCIS.
RSC staff conducted in-depth pre-screening interviews with applicants; assisted them in completing their case files and entered their required documentation into the Department of State’s Worldwide Refugee Admission Processing System (WRAPS); verified data and sent information to other U.S. agencies for background and security checks. They also scheduled USCIS refugee eligibility interviews for the applicants.
RSCs captured biographic data, including names, dates of birth, and other data points at the time of pre-screening, that is “subsequently provided to the intelligence community (IC) and law enforcement partners through a centralized and coordinated process established in fiscal year 2022 at the National Vetting Center (NVC).” RSCs played a central role in the process of vetting potential refugees for security threats:
U.S. national security agencies, including the National Counterterrorism Center, FBI, Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Department of Defense, and the Department of State, as well as the intelligence community, begin screening the applicant using the data transmitted from the RSCs. [Emphasis added.]
USCIS refugee officers reviewed all the information that the RSC had collected and the results of security screening processes and conducted an in-person interview with each refugee applicant before deciding whether to approve him or her for classification as a refugee and deem him or her eligible for resettlement.
During the adjudication interview, the USCIS officer asked many of the same or similar questions answered in the prescreening interview conducted by RSC staff.
Potential Fraud and Biases
RSC staff (who are generally citizens of the countries they are stationed in) are entrusted with an important part of the resettlement process. Many worked in difficult conditions and are citizens of unsettled countries where corruption is at times deemed an acceptable, even necessary, means of survival. Allegations of fraud, bribery, and corruption taking place within RSCs have been reported in numerous countries.
By UNHCR’s own admission, "Refugee status and resettlement places are valuable commodities, particularly in countries with acute poverty, where the temptation to make money by whatever means is strong. This makes the resettlement process a target for abuse.”
RSC staff screening and appraisals can be at best complaisant and at worst open to the highest bidder.
A U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) review in 2017 of USRAP’s screening process and vulnerability to fraud uncovered major concerns with RSC case preparations, including staff fraud. GAO staff observed RSC caseworkers as they reviewed applicants’ identification documents (passport, birth certificate, marriage certificate), recorded name variations (alternate spellings) and family tree information, and took note of the applicants’ flight journey and persecution stories (information later used by USCIS officers in their interviews).
GAO found that measures put in place by the U.S. State Department to monitor RSCs’ performance and evaluate their key activities like pre-screening and preparation of case files for resettlement applicants were insufficient. Of the 70 Refugee Affairs Division (RAD) trip reports GAO analyzed that contained feedback on RSC activities, only 10 (14 percent) showed satisfaction with RSC case preparations; 45 (64 percent) identified major concerns. Other concerns such as staff fraud and applicant fraud were also underlined by GAO in that review.
The GAO report highlighted refugee officers’ training shortcomings as well.
Even if measures have been taken since to monitor RSCs’ performance and address refugee officers’ challenges, program vulnerabilities and personnel subjectivities should not be dismissed, especially under the Biden-Harris administration that encouraged NGO referrals and private sponsorships.
Reinterviews: Too Costly?
Critics of Trump’s planned refugee reinterviews also argue that it would be “a tremendous waste of government resources to review and reinterview 200,000 people.” But even if all refugees admitted under the previous administration were to be reinterviewed – a scenario that appears unlikely, given reports that a targeted list will be available within three months – the cost would still be far lower than the Biden-Harris planned expenditures.
For FY 2025 alone, Biden proposed spending $5.1 billion on refugee processing and resettlement, five times more than the average cost before he took office. Under the prior administration, the cost kept increasing: from $967 million in FY 2021, $1.4 billion in FY 2022, $2.2 billion in FY 2023, to $2.8 billion in FY 2024.
For comparison, the cost was around $1 billion whether under Trump or Obama: $892 million in FY 2020, $1 billion in FY2019, $1 billion in FY2018, $1.5 billion in FY2017, $1.2 billion in FY2016, $1 billion in FY2015, $1 billion in FY2014, and $1 billion in FY2013.
Moreover, the prior administration extended the benefits and beneficiaries of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) to include non-refugees on U.S. soil; hundreds of thousands of Afghan and Ukrainian parolees were added to ORR’s list of beneficiaries. For FY 2025, in addition to refugee arrivals through USRAP (capped at 125,000), ORR was projecting to serve 531,500 other arrivals.
Proper Vetting?
In general, the refugee resettlement program poses a substantial security challenge. The vetting of refugees, no matter how “extreme”, is not enough. The task of checking refugees’ backgrounds is often impossible, given the lack of solid on-the-ground intelligence systems and the absence of dependable screening measures from conflict zones.
The Biden-Harris expansion and modernization of the USRAP resulted in the admission of increasing numbers of refugees from unsettled countries such as Syria, Afghanistan, or even Venezuela.
Furthermore, the prior administration took measures that facilitated refugee admissions but may have resulted in increased security hazards:
- It partnered with the U.S. Digital Corps to upgrade the main technology system that “supports the United States’ Refugee and Asylum programs to ensure it scales for unprecedented goals in resettling refugees”. The result was an increased functionality in global case management systems (electronic review of information, digitization of registration forms, expansion of video-teleconference interviews, etc.), leading to faster processing times.
- It redesigned overseas processing steps: The Department of State, DHS, and the U.S. Digital Service redesigned overseas processing by allowing concurrent steps rather than sequential ones. This new approach, first used for Afghans, was later expanded to other populations. By late 2023, more than half of all refugees interviewed worldwide went through concurrent processing. This remake led to faster processing times (weeks or months instead of historically years-long ones).
- It integrated refugee vetting into the National Vetting Center in an effort to simplify “the ways that DHS uses intelligence and law enforcement information to inform decisions, while maintaining strong privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties protections”.
- It launched a new automated process that streamlined the process for refugees (and other eligible populations) to obtain Employment Authorization Documents (EADs, or work permits) and Social Security cards. The wait time for an EAD was shortened from several months to approximately 30 days. Under the new fully automated process, refugees were no longer required to apply for EADs, which were instead to be mailed to them via U.S. Postal Service Priority Mail. USCIS was also to electronically provide the Social Security Administration with the information required to assign a Social Security number and mail these cards to refugees.
- It launched the Safe Mobility Initiative to facilitate expedited refugee processing for individuals from Latin America via USRAP.
- It launched the “Welcome Corps” private sponsorship program within USRAP that opened the door to preferential treatment and biases. By its nature, it favored the subjective, personalized selection of individuals to be resettled here and allowed for the preferential selection of “refugees” by their friends/family already here.
- It formalized a partnership with the Equitable Resettlement Access Consortium (ERAC), led by HIAS alongside Refuge Point and the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP), to grow the network of NGOs that refer individuals directly to USRAP. This model for refugee referrals expanded “equitable access to resettlement while establishing global partnerships with UNHCR, refugee-led organizations, organizations serving LGBTQI+ refugees, and other stakeholders in the field of refugee protection”.
- It encouraged family reunification and vowed to continue to “streamline and improve following-to-join refugee processing” for spouses and/or unmarried children under the age of 21 who were not previously granted refugee status.
It expanded access to USRAP for Afghans. In August 2021, the State Department announced a special refugee designation (Priority 2 (P-2)) for certain Afghans and their eligible family members (spouses and children of any age, whether married or unmarried). It also introduced a “Family Reunification for Afghans” program that allowed Afghan parolees who are here supposedly temporarily to sponsor their family members to come to the United States as refugees (i.e. as potential future American citizens).
In light of the case of Rahmanullah Lakanwal – an Afghan paroled into the United States under Biden – who is now charged in the ambush attack that killed one National guard member and critically injured another, this is particularly alarming.