Utahns advocate for 753,000 immigrants stuck in U.S. citizenship application backlog

by McKenzie Stauffer
Monday, July 30th 2018



Many of the 117 immigrants from 37 countries take the oath of citizenship from U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis, in the Northern District of Illinois, during a naturalization ceremony Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2017, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)

(KUTV) -- Crossing the U.S. border is one thing, becoming a legal citizen is a whole other trial for immigrant families.

Due to backlogging, over 753,000 immigrants across the country are waiting to complete the U.S. citizenship process.

At the end of March 2018, Utah had a backlog of applications with some legal permanent residents (LPRs) waiting as long as 20 months for their applications to be processed.

Utah has experienced the largest increase in application backlog in the country, which is almost 70 percent from last years' figures.

However, Utah isn't the only state experiencing this phenomenon. Nationally, the backlog has increased by 93 percent since January 2016.

Because of this ever-growing problem, Salt Lake City and Salt Lake County mayors are two of nearly 50 U.S. mayors and county executives who have delivered a letter to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Director Lee Francis Cissna demanding the agency reduce the backlog of over 753,000 citizenship applications.

City officials are also calling for Cissna to shorten the citizenship application process down to six months.

“The practices of this administration are discouraging many Utah families from going through the already complicated naturalization process” Luis Garza, Executive Director of Comunidades Unidas, a member of the National Partnership for New Americans (NPNA), who spearheaded this effort said in a news release.

“We urge other state and local leaders to demand more efficiency and transparency at USCIS so more Utah families have an opportunity to become US Citizens in a timely manner.”

In 2017, for the second year in a row, USCIS failed to naturalize more LPRs with pending applications that it actually naturalized, according to a news release.

At its current rate, the USCIS would take over 25 years to get back down to the previous administration's backlog level in 2015. That is assuming no new applications are sent in.

The letter, written by mayors and county executives, asks for specifics on previous measures taken by the agency and an analysis of why those measures failed.

“This alarming backlog means that many in our community who started the naturalization process many months ago hoping to vote in the midterm election will not be able to do so," Mayra Cedano, Civic Engagement Program Manager at Comunidades Unidas said in a news release. “It is preventing full participation and integration of our communities and should be addressed immediately.”

Read the entire letter here:
[FONT=%20Helvetica][FONT=Helvetica][I][I][I][I]Naturalization Letter - Mayor Rahm Emanuel - 7-30-2018 (002)

https://kutv.com/news/local/utahns-a...cation-backlog