Greetings. This installment of Immigration Disclosures highlights the American Immigration Council and the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA)’s recent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit on the suspension in processing green card applications for refugees and asylees, an update on U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) processing of FOIA requests for A-files, and an interactive new tool featuring data on the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program.
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On June 24, the Council and AILA filed a lawsuit against USCIS and the Department of Homeland Security to compel the agencies to release records about their decision to stop processing green card applications filed by asylees and refugees. The lawsuit follows the organizations’ FOIA request in April, filed to find out more about March 25, 2025, media reports indicating that USCIS had stopped processing these applications. The suspension impacts thousands of individuals who fled their home countries out of fear of persecution and are now in the process of applying for their green cards. Read more here.
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In a June compliance report filed by USCIS, as required by a court injunction entered in Nightingale v. USCIS, the agency stated that its processing of FOIA requests for A-files within the time allowed by the law fell to approximately 59%. Back in 2019, the Council, the National Immigration Litigation Alliance, the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, and the Law Offices of Stacy Tolchin sued USCIS to address the increasing backlog of FOIA request for A-files pending with USCIS and ICE. As a result, USCIS reported as recently as March that it timely completed over 99% of A-file requests. The agency blamed the drop on the significant staffing shortages experienced by the USCIS FOIA program. Read the Compliance Report here.
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The Council Shares Data on Where Refugees Were Resettled |
On June 26, the Council released a tool based on demographic data obtained through FOIA showing information about refugees resettled in U.S. cities and states throughout the country from October 1, 2017, through December 31, 2024. The data includes refugees’ nationality, age, gender, education level, native language, and English proficiency.
The U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) managed by the U.S. Department of State is a legal pathway through which refugees can be resettled in the United States from abroad. The State Department publishes data showing the number of refugees that settle in each state and the monthly breakdown of resettlement by state and nationality. The agency used to publish more granular data including city-level placement of refugees up until 2018 but took the data down.
In April 2024, the Council filed a request under FOIA with the Department of State for individualized, demographic, educational, and locational data on refugees admitted to the United States. The request also sought the data dictionaries the department maintains to effectively understand the government’s data. In July, the Council filed a lawsuit against the Department of State for failing to respond to the FOIA request.
One of the main issues in receiving the data was how to balance the need for information about refugee resettlement by locality while maintaining the privacy of refugees. The more detailed the data, the easier it could be to re-identify individuals. After months of litigation, the State Department provided the Council with multiple spreadsheets on all refugees resettled in the United States from October 1, 2017, to December 31, 2024. To maintain refugees’ privacy, the Council and the State Department agreed that in localities where less than 10 refugees of a given nationality were resettled (city, state, or United States as a whole) in a given calendar or fiscal year, refugees’ demographic data would be redacted. The Council is willing to share the city-level data on a case-by-case basis upon request. However, when publicly sharing the data, the Council will increase the threshold for withholding demographic data to 50 individuals for any specific group.
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Researchers, advocates, and local communities need more granular information to effectively welcome refugees and help them establish lives in the cities where they resettle.
- City-level data assists in resource allocation: local governments, schools, hospitals, and nonprofits need detailed data to plan services such as language access, housing, mental health and trauma care, as well as job placement programs.
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The American Immigration Council works to hold the
government accountable on immigration issues. We harness freedom of information requests, litigation, and advocacy to expose the wrongdoing and promote transparency within immigration agencies. Make a donation today.
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