Department of Homeland Security inspector general John Roth issued an urgent warning on Monday to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, an agency within DHS: Don’t reinstate the Electronic Immigration System (ELIS), the discontinued system of processing naturalization applicants, because of “alarming security concerns regarding inadequate background checks and other functionality problems.”
If the USCIS gets its way, the flawed ELIS system will be relaunched later this month — before the full review is complete. In an attempt to draw attention to this, Roth opted to release preliminary findings in the hope that USCIS officials would change their plans.
In a November 2016 audit, Roth described ELIS’s deficiencies as “far worse than originally thought,” and since then, none of its faults have been resolved. Before the USCIS discontinued ELIS, it had produced nearly 20,000 green cards with incorrect information, and 2,400 immigrants, approved for a two-year residency, were issued cards with ten-year expiration dates. “It appears that thousands of Green Cards have simply gone missing,” Roth wrote. “In the wrong hands, Green Cards may enable terrorists, criminals, and undocumented aliens to remain in the United States.”
Roth discovered far more than ELIS’s erroneous green cards. As of January 11, approximately 175 applicants have been granted citizenship with incomplete or inaccurate background checks. “Without sufficient vetting,” Roth said, future “immigrants could potentially be granted U.S. citizenship although they are ineligible or pose national security threats.”
Which is to say that since ELIS’s implementation, the USCIS has wrongfully granted citizenship to potential terrorists and criminals, and allowed some green-card applicants to have an extra eight years stay — and, still, officials seek to reinstate this flawed system. The USCIS is not required to abide by the inspector general’s recommendations, but it ought to.