SILVER SPRING, Md — HIAS is deeply alarmed by recent reporting that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) intends to re-interview nearly 200,000 refugees who were lawfully admitted to the United States between January 20, 2021, and February 20, 2025.
“This plan is shockingly ill-conceived,” said Naomi Steinberg, HIAS Vice President of U.S. Policy and Advocacy. “It would retraumatize tens of thousands of vulnerable refugees who already went through years of security vetting prior to stepping on U.S. soil. This is a new low in the administration’s consistently cold-hearted treatment of people who are already building new lives and enriching the communities where they have made their homes.”
The U.S. Refugee Admissions program also already includes years of security screening by multiple federal agencies, making resettled refugees the single most vetted population admitted to the country.
Refugees admitted through the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program have already endured years or decades of trauma, instability, and loss. The prospect of being summoned back into an interview process—paired with the threat of losing access to permanent residency—disrupts the sense of safety and belonging that resettlement is intended to restore.
As the world’s oldest refugee agency, which has been part of the U.S. Refugee Admissions program since its inception 45 years ago, HIAS is unequivocal in its opposition to this proposal, and in our commitment to thousands of our clients who we helped to make a new start in this country.
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