The
This This includes the issuance of U.S. visas at U.S. Consulates and Embassies worldwide.
These changes have been made in response to President Trump’s executive order entitled, “One Voice for America’s Foreign Relations,” signed on February 12th.
The President’s executive order calls upon the Department of State headed by Marco Rubio to make dramatic changes to the way foreign U.S. Consulates and Embassies operate.
This includes making the following changes:
Consular officers and employees must faithfully implement the President’s foreign policies
Failure to implement the President’s agenda will be grounds for professional discipline, which may result in firing Consular personnel
- The Secretary of State will change the foreign service to better align with the President’s foreign policy agenda
- These reforms include making changes to the recruitment, performance, evaluation, and retention standards of foreign service employees including U.S. Consular officers
- The Secretary of State will make revisions and replacements to the Foreign Affairs Manual (FAM). The U Sources close to the President have said that U.S. Embassies and Consulates have been asked to reduce U.S. staff members and locally employed staff by at least 10%.
- The Future of Consular Visa Processing
- Unfortunately, these directives will have extremely harsh consequences for U.S. consular visa processing at Embassies and Consulates worldwide.
- Staff shortages mean that wait times for both immigrant and nonimmigrant visa interviews will increase significantly.
For instance, applicants with cases at busy U.S. Consulates and Embassies that have a high demand for visa interviews such as Ciudad Juarez, Mumbai, and Manila, may be stuck in the long visa queues for the foreseeable future. This is devastating news considering that family members may be separated for prolonged periods of time.
This is further complicated by the harsh reality that the Department of State has been grappling with a growing backlog of nearly 400,000 immigrant visa cases since the Coronavirus pandemic.
Separately, changes made to the Foreign Affairs Manual, handbooks, and guidance used by Consular officers to issue visas will likely lead to increasing denial rates, more visa scrutiny, and even more applications being placed in 221(g) administrative processing.
Department of Homeland Security Slashes Workforce
The Trump administration has also ordered the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to cut its workforce.
Last week, the media reported that the agency cut 405 employees from its workforce. Citizens Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).
Regarding these firings a DHS spokesperson said, “Under President Trump’s leadership, we are making sweeping cuts and reform across the federal government to eliminate egregious waste and incompetence that has been happening for decades at the expense of the American taxpayer.”
Immigration Court Judges Terminated
As if that weren’t bad enough, on Friday the Trump administration fired 20 immigration judges working for the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) without offering any explanation.
The EOIR is part of the Department of Justice (DOJ) and is responsible for administering the immigration court system for individuals who are in removal proceedings.
These judges collectively preside over removal proceedings to determine whether individuals charged with violating U.S. immigration law should be allowed to remain in the country.
The immigration courts are currently experiencing an unprecedented backlog of over 3.7 million cases, making these firings extremely unsettling.
Conclusion
While these actions align with the President’s larger goals of shrinking the size of the federal government as well as facilitating mass deportations, they raise serious questions regarding civil rights and constitutional violations that may soon give rise to a new string of lawsuits against the government.
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