2/17/2008 - USCIS Service Centers Already Reviewing Pending Name Check Cases Under New Policy, Local Office Guidance Awaited

The Service Center Operations Liaison (SCOPS) of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has confirmed to the American Immigration Lawyers' Association (AILA) that individual USCIS Service Centers are conducting "sweeps" of cases they have pending to see if any of them can now be approved under the new name check guidance announced February 4, 2008.

Under the February 4 guidance, many applications which before had been held indefinitely pending completion of name checks by the FBI, but were otherwise approvable, will now be approved if the name check takes more than 180 days from initiation. The cases affected include most applications which would still allow for detention and removal of the applicant after approval if the name check eventually came back with negative information (essentially every type of application which had been delayed for FBI name checks except for citizenship applications).

While many AILA chapters have contacted local District USCIS offices for information on how these offices will implement the new guidance and adjudicate these name-check-pending cases, no complete answer has been forthcoming on this at a national level.