Tag Archive for: u s citizenship and immigration services

EXCLUSIVE: Trump Admin Launching New Vetting Unit In Wake Of National Guard Attack

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The Trump administration will be dramatically enhancing its screening of all foreign nationals with the launch of a new vetting center.

In response to a slate of high-profile arrests of Afghan men accused of committing or planning serious attacks on American soil, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is establishing a specialized unit intending to markedly upgrade the country’s vetting procedures of migrants, according to a memo exclusively obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation. The new vetting center will help federal officials identify terrorists, criminal aliens or other foreigners who pose a danger to the country.

“USCIS’ role in the nation’s immigration system has never been more critical,” Joe Edlow, the director of the agency, said in a public statement.

“In the wake of several recent incidents of violence, including a foreign national attacking National Guard service members on U.S. soil, establishing this vetting center will give us more enhanced capabilities to safeguard national security and ensure public safety,” Edlow continued.

The new vetting center, when fully operational, will “draw on the full spectrum” of screening capabilities and leverage state-of-the-art technology when reviewing immigration applications and petitions, according to the memo. Headquartered in Atlanta, the center will also be tasked with reviewing already-approved applications for foreign nationals and prioritizing applications from designated countries of concern.

Trump officials say the enhanced screening is necessary after four years of the Biden administration, which oversaw a historic border crisis and a chaotic military withdrawal from Afghanistan that sparked the importation of thousands of Afghan nationals.

“Under the Biden administration, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services was pushed to expedite the immigration and naturalization processes with little regard for how that affected national security and the safety of our communities,” Edlow stated. “We changed that approach on day one of the Trump administration.”

“Under President Trump, we are building more protective measures that ensure fraud, deception, and threats do not breach the integrity of our immigration system,” the USCIS director continued.

The Trump White House, which has long prioritized border security, has doubled down on security efforts since Rahmanullah Lakanwal, an Afghan national brought into the country in 2021 under humanitarian parole, allegedly killed one National Guard member and left another in critical condition in an ambush-style attack in Washington, D.C., hours before Thanksgiving Day.

Immediately after the attack, federal immigration officials dramatically restricted asylum applications for all foreign nationals and completely halted immigration processes for individuals hailing from 19 countries deemed to be “high-risk.” On Wednesday, USCIS announced it was scaling back the timeframe in which asylum seekers and other foreign nationals can have valid work permits in the U.S.

Including Lakanwal, three different Afghan nationals let into the country through the Biden-era Operation Allies Welcome program have been arrested within a week. The FBI arrested Mohammad Dawood Alokozay on Nov. 25 for allegedly making bomb threats in Fort Worth, Texas and Jaan Shah Safi was arrested by immigration officials on Wednesday for allegedly providing support to ISIS-K.

AUTHOR

Jason Hopkins

Immigration Reporter

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

EXCLUSIVE: Top Trump Official Breaks Down How Key Office Is Sniffing Out Illegal Voters

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As the Trump administration wages a war against foreign nationals daring to vote in American elections, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Director Joseph Edlow has spearheaded game-changing policy reforms to root them out.

When President Donald Trump returned to office, he quickly signed an executive order to strengthen the citizenship verification process and help keep foreign nationals  from participating in American elections. USCIS, the federal agency that administers legal immigration, has since streamlined resources for elected leaders to better identify and remove noncitizens from their state’s voter rolls.

Edlow — who now leads an agency of more than 20,000 people tasked with managing the country’s immigration system — says they’re just getting started.

“We’re already more secure in elections than we were six months ago,” Edlow said to the Daily Caller News Foundation. “My goal is have our next election, the midterms, be one of the most secure elections in American history.”

The Senate confirmed Edlow as director of USCIS in July, and he began leading the agency shortly afterward. Formerly serving as deputy director for policy and chief counsel at the agency during the first Trump administration, Edlow is now at the forefront of the White House’s efforts to totally eradicate foreign influence in U.S. elections.

Trump set the pace on voter integrity reform in March when he signed Executive Order 14248, “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections,” an order that bolsters the citizenship verification process and prohibits foreigners from interfering in U.S. elections. The order additionally directs the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the parent department of USCIS, to offer the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) database free of charge to every state to protect election integrity.

SAVE is an online service administered by USCIS that allows various government agencies to verify the immigration status or U.S. naturalization of applicants seeking benefits or licenses. State officials cracking down on voter fraud have said access to the database has turbocharged their efforts.

“Gaining access to this database has been a game-changer,” Republican Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson said in June. “Not only have we been able to identify individuals who should not have voted in the last election, we have also been able to confirm naturalization of dozens more.”

Nelson’s comments were in reaction to the discovery of 33 potential noncitizens who voted in the 2024 presidential election in Texas. Since that announcement, Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton revealed that over 100 suspected noncitizens are believed to have cast more than 200 ballots in the 2022 and 2020 election cycles.

“[The SAVE] system, while it initially was used for benefits granting agencies to determine whether someone was eligible for public benefits, it has really been used for this purpose now, and we’ve modernized it to allow secretaries of state and other election officials to batch audit large group, a large, large group of records to determine whether someone is eligible to register to vote,” Edlow said to the DCNF.

In May, USCIS put SAVE’s usefulness into overdrive by partnering with the Social Security Administration to ensure a reliable source for verifying immigration status and American citizenship. Under the update, local and state officials are now able to input Social Security numbers for verification of American citizenship and prevent foreign nationals from voting in American elections.

More specifically, the new partnership allows government agencies to create cases in SAVE using an applicant’s Social Security number rather than a DHS identifying number, which is not collected by a majority of state and local agencies, according to Edlow. For the first time, agencies are now able to submit more than one case at a time, which has streamlined the process.

“We have now an agreement with the Social Security Administration whereby you can use a nine digit social security number and we can return hits for you to determine whether someone is a citizen or not, for voter verification purposes,” Edlow said.

“And we’re continuing to improve it, we’re constantly testing it,” the USCIS director went on. “We’re looking to go down from the full nine to the last four of the social with that yet, but we’re going to get there soon.”

When government officials have identified noncitizens who allegedly participated in a federal U.S. election, the Trump administration hasn’t hesitated to throw the book.

Federal prosecutors charged two Ukrainian nationals in April with unlawfully voting in the 2024 presidential election and, in that same month, charged a 45-year-old Iraqi national of illegally voting in the 2020 presidential election. In May, federal prosecutors revealed that a Colombian illegal migrant lived in the U.S. for decades under a stolen identity and voted in the 2024 presidential election, along with allegedly stealing around roughly $400,000 in rental assistance, Social Security and food stamp benefits

It can be hard to quantify how many noncitizens have potentially voted in past U.S. elections. Michigan officials in October charged a Chinese national of voting in the 2024 election — but only after he reached out to his local clerk’s office and asked if he could get his ballot back. That Chinese man fled the country one day before Trump returned to office.

In addition to cracking down on foreign nationals who’ve voted in elections, the Trump administration has also put the pressure on localities not doing enough to keep them off the voter rolls.

In June, federal prosecutors rolled out a lawsuit against Orange County, California, for allegedly not handing over all documentation proving election officials are actively removing noncitizens from their voter registration lists. A month prior, the administration sued North Carolina and its Board of Elections for allegedly failing to maintain a voter registration list compliant with federal laws.

While the Trump administration continues its crackdown, the director of USCIS says his office will keep improving the SAVE database and election integrity as a whole.

“As things pop up, we’re going to make changes, and we’re going to make this a better system,” Edlow said. “The worst SAVE is ever going to be is the way that you see it today, because every day we are making more improvements to it.”

AUTHOR

Jason Hopkins

Immigration Reporter

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

EXCLUSIVE: Trump Admin Rolls Out New Tool To Stop Noncitizens From ‘Hijacking’ U.S. Elections

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The Trump administration is unrolling a new initiative Thursday that will help prevent noncitizens from voting in U.S. elections, a high-priority policy for the White House.

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is updating the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) program and partnering with the Social Security Administration in order to ensure “a single, reliable source for verifying immigration status and U.S. citizenship,” according to a memo exclusively shared with the Daily Caller News Foundation. Under the update, state and local officials will be able to input Social Security numbers for verification of U.S. citizenship and thereby prevent foreign nationals from voting in American elections.

“For years, states have pleaded for tools to help identify and stop aliens from hijacking our elections,” USCIS Spokesman Matthew Tragesser said in a statement provided to the DCNF.

“Under the leadership of President Trump and Secretary Noem, USCIS is moving quickly to eliminate voter fraud,” Tragesser continued. “We expect further improvements soon and remain committed to restoring trust in American elections.”

SAVE, an online service administered by USCIS, allows various government agencies to verify the immigration status or U.S. naturalization of applicants seeking benefits or licenses.

The new partnership allows government agencies to create cases in SAVE using an applicant’s Social Security number rather than a Department of Homeland Security identifying number, which is not collected by a majority of state and local agencies, according to a separate news release. Additionally, agencies for the first time will be able to submit more than one case at a time, streamlining the process.

The new tool’s unveiling drew praise from the Tennessee secretary of state’s office, which has been involved in a select group of states providing testing and feedback on these verification updates.

“I commend President Trump and his team for building a super tool for election officials to identify and remove ineligible voters,” Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett said in a statement provided to the DCNF. “I predict this system, once fully developed, will be a game changer for election officials.”

“President Trump’s super election integrity tool means if you are an ineligible registered voter in Tennessee, we will find you,” Hargett said.

Polling indicates that basic voter protection regulations, such as requiring a photo ID to vote and providing proof of citizenship when registering to vote for the first time, are incredibly popular among Americans.

Since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has prioritized reforms to keep noncitizens out of U.S. elections. The president in March signed Executive Order 14248, Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections, which aims to protect voting systems from fraud, systemic error and foreign influence.

Trump has also voiced strong support for the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, legislation sponsored by Texas GOP Rep. Chip Roy that would require states to obtain proof of citizenship prior to registering an individual for any federal election and also requires state officials to remove all noncitizens from existing voter rolls. That bill passed the House in April, with only four Democrat lawmakers voting in favor of it.

Despite pushback from Democrats who claim GOP concerns over noncitizen voting is overblown, numerous high-profile cases of foreign participation in U.S. elections have been documented in recent months.

Federal prosecutors in April charged two Ukrainian nationals — 53-year-old Svitlana Demydenko and her 22-year-old daughter, Yelyzaveta Demydenko — with unlawfully voting in the 2024 presidential election. Akeel Abdul Jamiel — a 45-year-old Iraqi national — was accused by federal prosecutors that same month of participating in the 2020 presidential election.

State officials in Texas, Alabama, Virginia and Ohio identified as many as 17,000 noncitizens on state voting rolls and worked to remove them from the books ahead of the 2024 general election. America First Legal, a Washington, D.C.-based group aligned with the Trump administration, sued Maricopa County, Arizona, in August after the county recorder allegedly failed to purge 35,000 registered voters who did not provide proof of U.S. citizenship.

The Trump administration hinted at more updates to come in the future.

“USCIS will continue to improve and add more capability and functionality to SAVE,” the USCIS news release reads. “Providing more tools within SAVE ensures state and local governments have robust and reliable access to federal databases to confirm the U.S. citizenship of individuals on their voting rolls and registering to vote, in support of [Trump’s executive order].”

Editor’s note: This article has been updated to include comment from Tennessee secretary of state’s office.

AUTHOR

Jason Hopkins

Immigration Reporter.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.