Federal Citizenship Agency Delays Furloughs for Two-Thirds of Its Staff

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services is delaying its planned furlough of 13,400 employees nationwide, including 2,300 in California, through Aug. 30, the agency confirmed Friday morning.

USCIS spokeswoman Jessica Collins attributed the change in plans to an uptick in application fees and “assurances from Congress” that they’ll procure a financial bailout for the struggling agency.

“This delay is intended to allow Congress enough time to act and provide USCIS with the funding needed in order to avert the administrative furlough all together,” Collins said in a statement.

U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, Senate Appropriations Committee vice chairman, said he got an assurance by phone from Joseph Edlow, USCIS deputy director for policy, that the furloughs, which were scheduled to go into effect Aug. 3, would be postponed.

“Furloughing thousands of public servants in the middle of a pandemic and at record unemployment would have upended the lives of the dedicated women and men working at USCIS and impacted thousands who rely on their services,” Leahy said in a statement. “After new revenue estimates showed the agency ending the fiscal year with a surplus it was completely unjustifiable.”

Unlike other federal agencies, USCIS depends on application fees to fund the vast majority of its operations.

On May 15, the agency notified Congress that the COVID-19 pandemic had decimated its budget and that it needed $1.2 billion to avoid furloughing more than two-thirds of its staff. All operations would be impacted, the agency said.

Earlier this month, USCIS revised its fiscal outlook to reflect more revenue. But Collins said a bailout is still needed to keep the agency running.

“USCIS’ funding request of $1.2 billion remains unchanged, and the agency is depending on Congress to provide emergency funding to ensure agency operations continue uninterrupted,” she said.

Democratic lawmakers have been working to include funds for USCIS in the next COVID-19 stimulus package, but the two parties must resolve several disagreements before approving that bill. With less than two weeks before the furloughs were set to kick in, observers doubted the relief would come in time.

Hundreds of thousands of immigrants in California, as well as their American employers and relatives, rely on USCIS for naturalization, green cards, work permits and other benefits.

Just months before the November election, the agency is struggling through a backlog of hundreds of thousands of immigrants applying to become U.S. citizens, many of whom are hoping to be able to vote for the first time.