Legal immigration drops in U.S., application processing blamed

Associated Press - April 4, 2008 7:25 PM ET

WASHINGTON (AP) - Homeland Security says the number of people who legally immigrated to the U.S. dropped 17% last year.

Officials say the decline is largely due to administrative problems.

A total of 1.05 million people became legal permanent residents in 2007, falling from 1.27 million a year earlier.

Details are in a report by the department's Office of Immigration Statistics.

Citizenship and Immigration Services has been under fire after processing times grew because immigrants flooded the agency with applications filed last year in advance of a dramatic increases in filing fees.

But Homeland Security spokeswoman Veronica Nur Valdes says comparing the 2007 legal resident numbers to the previous year -- is unfair.

She says Citizenship and Immigration Services hit the height of a 5-year effort to reduce backlogs in 2006 and the drop in green cards reflects that.


On the Net:

http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/stat ... R_2007.pdf

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

http://www.kcbd.com/Global/story.asp?S=8121512