FAST-Tracking Naturalization While US At War With Terrorists?Is That A Good Idea?

By Bill West

In January 2004, I wrote an article published in FrontPage magazine concerning the issue of terrorist aliens slipping through the Government�s national security immigration net and becoming naturalized US citizens. That had been a problem going on for many years, due in large part to the inefficiencies and mismanagement inherent in the old Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) and the lack of communication and coordination among the various Intelligence and law enforcement agencies involved in counter-terrorism matters. Notwithstanding those problems, a few good cases were made, with successful investigations and prosecutions being realized.

The dissolution of the INS and creation of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with the sub-component Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as the immigration investigative agency promised to ensure better investigative coordination and enforcement of these kind of cases. The immigration benefit function was retained under DHS, but structured within a separate agency known as the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS). CIS is the agency solely responsible for processing and adjudicating naturalization applications, although ICE is responsible for investigating suspected violations of immigration law related to such applications, such as fraud, upon referral from CIS.

Those referrals, as it was when INS existed, are often the result of the expertise of the Adjudicators processing the naturalization applications catching fraud indicators in the paperwork or in the interviews they conduct. Unfortunately, even the most experienced and well-trained Adjudicators can be overwhelmed by workload, especially when the institutional process favors backlog reduction over quality adjudication. And, notwithstanding whatever rhetoric came out of the old INS and is now coming from the new CIS, backlog reduction has always been one of the top priorities. Pushing (and in reality approving) large numbers of naturalization applications is what led to the disaster known as �Citizenship USA� in the mid-1990s under the Clinton Administration, wherein thousands of unqualified aliens, including convicted felons, were naturalized.

I have now learned that CIS has decided, in its infinite bureaucratic wisdom, to implement a way to reduce the backlog of naturalization applications since seemingly they cannot give away immigration benefits fast enough to as many aliens as possible. A quick note�while CIS may be a �new� agency under DHS, the leftover immigration benefit managers from the old INS, the very immigration benefit granting institution that so miserably failed in the past, primarily manage it.

CIS has implemented something called the FAST program. This program will realize the hiring of temporary, term-hire Adjudicators. These temporary Adjudicators are receiving two and a half weeks of training at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) in Glynco, Georgia. That means the people who will be deciding who obtains UNITED STATES CITIZENSHIP will be temporary employees with less than three weeks training in the law, regulations, procedures and interviewing techniques that are involved in processing such applicants. Regular, full-time Adjudicators receive something on the order of a minimum of four months training.

The Clintonians inundated the INS benefit system with fast-track naturalization in the mid-90s under "Citizenship USA" and it was a disaster because REAL, EXPERIENCED, PROPERLY TRAINED and FULL-TIME Adjudicators were overwhelmed by a system that pushed PC approval over proper process. Now the Bush Administration and its Department of Homeland Security has devised this plan, essentially doing the same thing�reducing backlog at the expense of proper and safe process.

No doubt the company line from CIS and DHS will be the FAST temporary Adjudicators will be �adequately� trained and �appropriately� supervised and their work will not affect the security capability of that process. Americans have every reason to be very skeptical of such matters. It really does seem the more things change, the more they remain the same.

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