A once-anonymous US immigration whistle-blower has revealed his identity — and that asylum-seeker claims will soon be fast-tracked and beyond the control of judges or Congress.
United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) insider Aaron Stevenson came out of the shadows in the latest video from investigative journalism collective Project Veritas.
Stevenson, a USCIS Intelligence Research Specialist, had previously spoken to Veritas founder James O'Keefe with his face obscured and voice distorted, revealing how known sex traffickers were being granted work visas by the Department of Homeland Security and even applying to sponsor unaccompanied child immigrants.
He leaked an internal email to staff from USCIS Director Ur Jaddou, informing them that the agency could soon take the authority to grant political asylum from immigration judges — as around 1 million illegal immigrants have been being trafficked across the Mexican border since January.
"This is going to be the biggest change to immigration policy in my lifetime," Stevenson stressed. "It’s being done without anybody knowing what’s going on about it and there’s been no coverage for the American people to know what’s going on."
"The proposed system seeks to reduce processing times by transferring the initial responsibility for adjudicating certain protection claims from immigration judges to USCIS asylum officers," Jaddou wrote.
"This rule would simplify the adjudication process for certain individuals who are encountered at or near the border, placed into expedited removal proceedings, and determined to have a credible fear of persecution or torture."
Stevenson pointed out that USCIS is not taxpayer-funded, running instead on fees paid by immigrant applicants — which he said "leaves very little accountability to the public".
"When you couple that with giving the adjudicative authority away from an immigration judge to an asylum officer, you are removing any type of public pressure that they could apply on policies that they’re creating,” Stevenson warned, adding later: "It's not like even Congress can put the squeeze on politically."
And he said immigrants were exploiting the question of whether they had "reasonable fear" of suffering harm if deported to their home countries as a "loophole" gains residency of the US.
"If the asylum officers get this ability, I will say it’s going to be a rubber stamp of immediately getting ‘credible fear’ or ‘reasonable fear’ to be able to stay in the country if they’re going to be deported…also their path to citizenship," Stevenson said.
He said that within year of being granted asylum, individuals can adjust their status to that of a Lawful Permanent Resident (LPR), and three years later apply to become a naturalised US citizen.
"It's fast-tracking, and that's the only thing it's looking to consider," Stevenson pointed out. "In the actual rule proposal it's looking to make it quicker, that's it. They don't want a backlog."
The whistle-blower warned that the rule change would make it easier for foreign terrorists and war criminals to gain US residency and protection.
"We know we have no teeth, no ability to stop any type of actual benefit being provided, whether the person is... a terrorist, a nefarious state actor," Stevenson said. "They'll just appeal, whatever the decision is. They'll keep going to court until they win."
Th USCIS staffer said that by coming out and exposing the planned new system, he had ensured his own sacking and the loss of any future pension benefits.
"I'm a dead-end employee," he said. "I will lose my job." But he said he was not afraid, "because I think this is more urgent for people to realise, because of this policy change, it's going to continue to drive in any alien that they deem fit. This will drive a massive swing in immigration law."