INS Announces its Naturalization Process Has Integrity, Despite a Large Influx of Applications for Citizenship
Prior to May 1998

Many of you may recollect the scrutiny and negative publicity that INS received earlier this year for allegedly approving the citizenship of many alien criminals. The U.S. Justice Department had contracted with the accounting firm of KPMG Peat Marwick to audit its naturalization procedures.

According to INS the final audit now confirms the entire program's accuracy and integrity. The accounting firm KPMG Peat Marwick recently released a report confirming that district offices are complying with the new quality procedures initiated in June 1997.

AILA pointed out that fewer than 300 applicants were mistakenly granted citizenship in 1996, an error rate of under 1%. Nevertheless, since then the INS has taken additional steps to improve its quality control procedures.

Citizenship backlogs at INS continue to grow partly as a result of additional procedures and the shortage of staff. Many of you who have filed a Petition for Naturalization know that the time frames for completion of the process continue to grow all over the country. Recent statistics provided by AILA establish that in 1997, of the 1.6 million applications for naturalization that were received, only 569,822 were approved indicating that over 1 million applications for naturalization are currently pending.

INS intends to devise strategies to address this huge backlog, including large naturalization ceremonies which have been ongoing for the last several years but the process for the testing and interviewing, among other factors, all take a long time. Since U.S. citizenship is the light at the end of the long dark tunnel of waiting, it should all be worth it!