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Special Reports
U.S. GAO Scores Immigration Fraud; Congressmen Call For Change
Cybercast News Service
By Jeff Johnson
Posted Sunday February 17, 2002 - 04:05:29 AM EST
Capitol Hill - Five months after 19 non-U.S. citizens used four
hijacked jetliners to carry out the deadliest terrorist attack on
American soil, the General Accounting Office (GAO) has issued a
report saying that terrorists and drug dealers routinely abuse the
U.S. immigration system to facilitate their crimes.
"Immigration benefit fraud is a significant problem that threatens
the integrity of the legal immigration system," according to the GAO
report. "INS officials believe that the problem is pervasive and
serious; they also believe that some aliens are using the benefit
application process to enable them to carry out illegal activities,
such as crimes of violence, narcotics trafficking, and terrorism,"
the report stated.
Immigration benefit fraud involves attempts by aliens to obtain naturalization, work
authorization, and/or adjustment of status through illegal means such as the use of
fraudulent documents.
The report also detailed the failure of the INS to discover and eliminate fraud in the
immigration benefits application process in the past.
"Benefit fraud has been inconsistently investigated and INS resources are not used to
their greatest effect," the report concluded. "Without improvements in its benefit
fraud investigations, INS's ability to detect the nu
mber of ineligible aliens improperly applying for benefits will be hampered." House
Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) said the report points out
the threats to homeland security inherent in the cur
rent structure of INS.
"Based on this report, I'm not confident that the INS isn't giving green cards to al
Qaeda (terrorist) operatives," Sensenbrenner said. "We have a complete failure by the
INS to take the steps necessary to protect the peo
ple of the United States and the immigration system itself from criminals manipulating
the benefits process." Sensenbrenner believes the report proves what he has been
saying for years; that there is an "urgent need for a
comprehensive legislative restructuring of the INS." Rep. George W. Gekas (R-Pa.),
chairman of the Judiciary Committee's Immigration and Claims Subcommittee, agreed.
"The INS has shown itself unable to focus its efforts to address fraud in the benefits
process, and to utilize its resources effectively," Gekas said. "It is apparent that
INS has failed in its responsibility to provide i
mmigration benefits to those who are entitled to them and to deny them to those who
are not." GAO identified four major problems that it said contribute greatly to that
failure: * INS's interior enforcement strategy does
not specifically state how the investigative units at the districts and service
centers are to coordinate their activities.
* INS has not provided working-level guidance for its investigation units in the
districts and service centers.
* INS lacks an agency-wide case tracking and management capability to maintain
important data on prior, current, and future targets of benefit fraud investigations.
* INS adjudicators do not have access to the data that they need to do their jobs.
Some key findings of the report included: * A 90 percent fraud rate was found in one
review of a targeted group of 5,000 petitions. A follow-up analysis of approximately
1,500 petitions found that only one was not fraudul
ent.
* Some adjudication officers have had to sneak over to the operations unit to discuss
fraud-related issues because adjudication officers are discouraged from taking the
time to discuss questionable cases with investigator
s.
* Emphasis has been placed on timely processing of applications, allowing quality to
suffer, contributing to the increase in benefit fraud.
Gekas and Sensenbrenner have co-sponsored legislation, the Immigration Reform and
Accountability Act of 2001 (H.R. 3231), which seeks to address many of the problems
highlighted in the GAO report by replacing the INS with
separate bureaus to carry out the agency's two primary functions.
The proposal would supplant INS with the new "Agency for Immigration Affairs," which
would be run by a new Associate Attorney General for Immigration Affairs. It would
establish within the new agency both the "Bureau of I
mmigration Services and Adjudications," and the "Bureau of
Immigration Enforcement." The bill would also create a special office
within the Agency for Immigration Affairs to monitor and assess the
two new bureaus' success in balancing their roles and coordinating
with one another. Sensenbrenner says the changes are necessary for
the sakes of both fairness and safety.
"These benefits are valuable to the people who are patiently waiting
for them," he concluded. "But we must not allow these benefits to
provide a door into this country for those coming here to do us
harm."
� 2001 Cybercast News Service. This news item is distributed via
Middle East News Online (MiddleEastWire.com).
End<{{{
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