By Judicial Watch – Special Report
“Thousands of green cards have simply gone missing” according to a new federal audit that reveals scores have been “misdelivered,” include false information, were issued in duplicate or inadvertently grant foreigners approved for 24-month conditional residence status ten years of U.S. residency. This illustrates that under President Obama even legal immigration is lawless.
As unbelievable as this may seem it’s par for the course at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the Homeland Security agency that oversees lawful immigration. In the last three years alone USCIS received over 200,000 reports of green cards not being delivered to the approved applicant, at least 19,000 with incorrect data or issued twice and more than 2,400 with 10-year expiration dates for immigrants who had only been approved for a 24-month conditional stay. These startling transgressions are documented in a report issued this month by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Inspector General, which determined that the green card crisis is “far worse than originally thought.”
In the past year alone, USCIS inadvertently sent more than 6,200 duplicate green cards, the agency watchdog found, noting that this is not a new problem but rather a perpetual one. It gets better; over 5,400 of the duplicate cards were sent in one month alone (June). Homeland Security officials claim the error was caused by a card production software update that accidently generated duplicates for a backlog of cards waiting to be printed. “In the wrong hands, Green Cards may enable terrorists, criminals, and illegal aliens to remain in the United States and access immigrant benefits,” the IG writes in its report as if Homeland Security leaders don’t already know this. These “significant risks and burdens” have been addressed by federal investigators for years but the problems persist.
Just a few months ago the DHS IG released a report disclosing that USCIS had sent hundreds of green cards to the wrong address and that evidently opened a huge can of worms. Investigators kept digging and discovered that the problem was much worse than the previous report, issued in March, indicated. “New information regarding the scope and volume of improperly issued Green Cards received after publication of our previous report prompted initiation of this current audit,” the IG writes in this month’s audit. The results of the first probe were bad enough because it uncovered serious “weaknesses” in the agency’s ability to “effectively carry out is national security and system integrity goals.” There’s no telling the true extent of the problem or what future probes will dig up. >>> Read More