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Trump Admin Has Wasted So Much Money Harassing Immigrants That USCIS is Broke
Did the current administration waste so much money that now their immigration services need a bailout? It sure does look like it.
The immigration agency admonishing immigrants to pull themselves up by their bootstraps seems to have destroyed its own boots. For three years, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services — the federal agency that processes visas, work permits and naturalizations — has lectured immigrants about how they should become more self-sufficient. It has alleged, without evidence, that too many immigrants are on the dole.
Well, now USCIS is broke... begging Congress for a bailout.
The agency is funded almost entirely by user fees, rather than congressional appropriations. But under Trump’s leadership, it has mismanaged its finances so badly that it has sought an emergency $1.2 billion infusion from taxpayers.
And they have the nerve to blame COVID-19. Seriously....
The agency claims it’s a novel coronavirus victim. But USCIS was in financial trouble long before the virus’s outbreak. It acknowledged as much in public documents last fall, when it proposed a massive increase in user fees because of large projected budget deficits.
Discriminating against immigrants is bad for business.
When Trump took office, USCIS inherited a budget surplus. The administration has frittered away funds on phantom cases of immigration fraud — which, like the president’s allegations of voter fraud, it has struggled to prove is an actual widespread problem that’s been going undetected.
USCIS has siphoned resources to create a denaturalization task force, which strips citizenship from immigrants found to have lied or otherwise cheated on applications. Last year, the agency revealed intentions to double the size of its fraud detection unit.
The bigger drain on resources, though, is its deliberate creation of more busy work for immigrants and their lawyers — as well as thousands of USCIS employees. These changes are designed to make it harder for people to apply for, receive or retain lawful immigration status.
Here's some good news:
Unless it get a bailout, the agency will furlough three-quarters of its workforce next month....