Department of Homeland Security inspector general John Roth issued an urgent warning on Monday to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, an agency within DHS: Don’t reinstate the Electronic Immigration System (ELIS), the discontinued system of processing naturalization applicants, because of “alarming security concerns regarding inadequate background checks and other functionality problems.”
If the USCIS gets its way, the flawed ELIS system will be relaunched later this month — before the full review is complete. In an attempt to draw attention to this, Roth opted to release preliminary findings in the hope that USCIS officials would change their plans.
In a November 2016 audit, Roth described ELIS’s deficiencies as “far worse than originally thought,” and since then, none of its faults have been resolved. Before the USCIS discontinued ELIS, it had produced nearly 20,000 green cards with incorrect information, and 2,400 immigrants, approved for a two-year residency, were issued cards with ten-year expiration dates. “It appears that thousands of Green Cards have simply gone missing,” Roth wrote. “In the wrong hands, Green Cards may enable terrorists, criminals, and undocumented aliens to remain in the United States.”
