USCIS cancels furlough of 70 percent of its workforce

The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services on August 25 cancelled the planned furloughs of its 13,000 employees from August 30, 2020.

According to the immigration agency, the USCIS will be able to maintain operations through the end of FY20 with aggressive reduction in spending and steady increase in incoming revenue and receipts, the agency said in a statement.

The agency’s fiscal year is from October 1 to September 30, 2020. The agency employs about 20,000 people.

“Averting this furlough comes at a severe operational cost that will increase backlogs and wait times across the board, with no guarantee we can avoid future furloughs. A return to normal operating procedures requires congressional intervention to sustain the agency through fiscal year 2021," Joseph Edlow, deputy director for policy, the USCIS, said in a statement.

The cost reduction would come from reducing the scope of federal contracts that assist USCIS adjudicators in processing and preparing case files and support activities.

One should also anticipate operational impacts such as increased wait times for pending case inquiries with the USCIS Contact Center. Processing times would be longer and increase in time taken for granting adjusting status or naturalizing for aliens, the statement said.

“Previously, members of Congress requested that agency leadership avoid operational cuts of this magnitude. However, Congress must still act on a long-term solution that will provide the USCIS with the necessary financial assistance to sustain the agency throughout FY21 and beyond,” the statement said.

This comes a week after the US Senator Patrick Leahy, in a letter dated August 18, 2020, requested the Department of Homeland Security to delay the furlough of 13,400 employees in the USCIS.

According to him, the delay was unwarranted as the agency has enough funding to carry it through the financial year. “I am troubled by the fact that the USCIS is still proceeding with furloughs for this fiscal year despite the fact that the agency is consistently projecting to end the fiscal year with a sizeable carry-over balance. The resulting carry-over balance exists even after you factor in paying the staff through the fiscal year,” Leahy said in his letter.

A Forbes article explained that, from October 2019 till March 2020, the USCIS got more customer volumes compared to last year before COVID-19. It also added that things returned to normal by June 2020 and operations started.

The budget deficit, the article said, could be in the range of $250 million, much lesser than the $1.2 billion the USCIS wanted as a bailout package.