US government mistakenly grants citizenship to hundreds of Immigrants? [DETAILS]

The U.S. government has mistakenly granted citizenship to at least 858 immigrants who had pending deportation orders, according to an audit released today by the Homeland Security Department’s internal watchdog.

The department’s inspector general, John Roth, found that these individuals came from countries with high rates of immigration fraud or were registered as national security concerns. His team did not identify the individuals involved or the “special interest countries” from which they emigrated.

The problem became apparent after department employees working on citizenship applications did not have access to fingerprint records of some individuals, according to the audit. Roth said many paper fingerprint files from the past have not been digitized and, as a result, would not show up in searches when the immigrants applied for citizenship under a different name.

“This situation created opportunities for individuals to gain the rights and privileges of U.S. citizenship through fraud,” he said in a statement.

The audit recommended that any fingerprints in outstanding cases be added to the government’s database and that officials create a system to evaluate the individual cases of immigrants who were improperly granted citizenship. DHS officials agreed with the inspector general’s report and said the government is working on implementing changes and corrective actions.

The inspector general’s report specified that those granted citizenship were only “potentially” ineligible and were not necessarily granted citizenship incorrectly. A statement from the Department of Homeland Security said that the department is taking steps to correct the issues that led to the incomplete fingerprint records and that not all applicants whose records were incomplete wound up being granted citizenship.

“It is important to note that the fact that fingerprint records in these cases may have been incomplete at the time of the naturalization interview does not necessarily mean that the applicant was in fact granted naturalization, or that the applicant obtained naturalization fraudulently. Preliminary results from the file reviews show that in a significant number of these cases naturalization had been denied and that, in some, naturalization was not improperly granted,” department spokesman Neema Hakim said in the statement. “Other cases are subject to ongoing criminal investigation or to denaturalization proceedings that are pending or completed.”

In at least three cases, the inspector general’s office discovered previously-deported individuals who were granted citizenship and then obtained clearance for “security-sensitive work at commercial airports or maritime facilities and vessels.” The release said all three have since had their security credentials revoked.

“This situation created opportunities for individuals to gain the rights and privileges of U.S. citizenship through fraud,” Inspector General John Roth said. “To prevent fraud and ensure thorough review of naturalization applications, [U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services] needs access to these fingerprint records.”

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has made the vetting of immigrants as they enter the U.S. a major part of his presidential platform, suggesting during the GOP primary that America temporarily ban all Muslims from entering the U.S. until a more stringent vetting process could be put in place. He has since backed away from that proposal, which drew widespread criticism from both parties, in favor of a ban on immigration from “any nation that has been compromised by terrorism.”





ABC News