On December 22, 2025, the Council and Just Futures Law filed a FOIA request to gain more information about U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ (USCIS) August 19, 2025, policy that would classify “anti-Americanism” and “anti-Semitic” expression as negative discretionary factors in the adjudication of immigration benefits.
In the first few months of his second term, President Trump issued two executive orders declaring that the United States “must ensure that admitted aliens and aliens otherwise already present in the United States do not bear hostile attitudes toward its citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles...” Executive Order 14188, titled “Additional Measures To Combat Anti-Semitism,” specifically required the heads of certain government agencies, including DHS, to send reports on how they will work with universities to identify activities of noncitizens they deem to be “security and foreign policy related inadmissibility grounds.”
In line with these executive orders, on April 9, 2025, USCIS announced that it would begin considering “anti-Semitic activity” on social media as grounds for denying immigration benefit requests. Shortly thereafter, USCIS claimed also to have adopted social media vetting for “anti-Americanism,” greatly expanding the potential content that could act as a negative discretionary factor in immigration benefit applications. In August, USCIS updated its guidance on the use of discretion in the adjudication of certain immigration benefits.
However, USCIS has failed to provide a concrete definition as to what constitutes “anti-Americanism.” In publicly available content, the agency referenced a provision of the Immigration Nationality Act from 1952, which barred affiliations with communism or groups advocating violent overthrow of the government. This lack of a modern definition could allow immigration officers to make decisions based on their subjective interpretation of a broad phrase rather than a standardized measure.
To gain more information about the updated guidance, the Council and Just Futures Law requested policies, directives, training materials, standard operating procedures on the April 9, 2025 USCIS Social Media Screening Announcement, data on individuals who are subject to a social media search, and legal memoranda concerning the legal implications of denying immigration benefits based on their speech, beliefs, or associations.
