Recently we have seen several false statements regarding immigrants, and many people seem to be accepting them as accurate. They are not. Two of those false statements are addressed below. Do not let false information and fear mongers influence you – the facts are that immigrants add a tremendous value to our country.
The first false claim is that people who seek asylum are “fast tracked” to citizenship so they can vote. There is no basis for this statement.
In fact, the path from asylum applicant to US citizen is extremely slow – over a decade. No one is approved for asylum at the border; all they get there is a short hearing to determine if they have a legitimate basis to pursue asylum. If they do, then the time for the entire process is: after entering the US, a person seeking asylum normally needs about 6 months to prepare and file the application with proper supporting documentation. The typical asylum case is set for a full interview about 4 years after it is filed. If the applicant is approved after the hearing, he must wait for a full year before he can file for permanent resident status (“the green card”). (Frequently the decision is not mailed to the applicant for as many as two years, but we will assume that it is issued right after the hearing.) Once the green card case is filed, the normal processing time is approximately 18 months. After that case is approved, the person must be a permanent resident for five (5) years before he can file for citizenship. USCIS currently takes about one year to process a citizenship case to the point of interview. If the person passes his citizenship interview, USCIS schedules a swearing in ceremony about a month later. After the person is sworn in, he or she must register to vote, and that can take a couple of weeks. So, the total time from entry into the US as an asylum seeker for the person to become a US citizen (assuming that all their multiple applications are approved) is approximately thirteen (13) years. Hardly a fast track.
The second false claim is that the government is trying to expedite the process for “illegals” to become citizens, again so they can vote. This too is without any factual basis.
A person who is here illegally rarely has a path to legal status, much less citizenship. There is one exception to that rule: the DACA program allows undocumented noncitizens who entered the US as young children to stay and have work permission. Some of those DACA holders, but not all, have been able to file for permanent resident status, and the time to process that case is about 18 months. (If sponsored by a US citizen spouse or parent or adult child, they are called “immediate relatives”, but it’s not immediate at all.) Once that green card case is approved and they are permanent residents, then just like asylum seekers, before they can file for citizenship, they must be permanent residents for 5 years (3 years if they were sponsored for their green card as a child, parent or spouse of a USC, and have lived with a US citizen spouse for that entire 3-year period). The time for processing their citizenship case is the same as above. So, the shortest total time, even for a DACA who files for the green card as an immediate relative to become a US citizen is approximately 7.5 years. For people who are not immediate relatives, for them to obtain green card status typically requires them to leave the US and consular process. In addition, people who are not immediate relatives usually are subject to backlogs that can be more than 20 years, or as little as 3 or 4 years. So, even excluding those people who are subject to the backlogs, the fastest time for becoming a US citizen is at least 7.5 years. Not much of a fast track, either.
False claims like these are designed to make the reader feel that they are losing control over their future, and/or that the government is giving something away. Boiled down to their essence, people who spread these false claims are trying to strike fear in the heart of the person who reads or hears it. As a Board Certified immigration law specialist with over 35 years of experience in this area, I can confirm that nothing moves quickly through our immigration system, and that the processing times that are contained in this note are accurate.
Do not let people demonize immigrants. Base your decisions on the facts, not fear.