Name Check: Everything You Need to Know about This American Nightmare (Part I)

Introduction

So your case is current; you have done everything USCIS asks you to do for the purpose of applying the Green Card or naturalization; you even did the interview; but you find yourself out of processing time for two gruesome years while you cannot get a promotion or change job because of the pending immigration status; and the same thing happens to your wife; she cannot find a decent job locally even though she had a handful of Master degrees; she cannot travel freely even to Mexico (let alone Paris) to fulfill her inner romance; and that alone is enough reason for constant mood swings and quarrels and fights between you guys. But before you file divorce, please read along and this article may be the exact counseling you need.

You probably already knew that your case was stuck due to FBI Name Check, as confirmed by your service request or congressman’s inquiry to USCIS. To some fellow immigrants, your seemingly endless 2-year delay is just a short sting in comparison because they have waited for 3, 4, even 5 years for the completion of the Name Check.

So how bad the situation really is? According to the most recent (May 2007) USCIS’ statistics, more than 55,000 applicants are stuck in FBI Name Check for more than 2 years. And that not even includes those stuck in both FBI Name Check AND USCIS’ own backlog factory at the same time. Counting these unfortunate immigrants who are on “double probation”, the number of applicants stuck in Name Check for more than 1 year is well above 200,000; and the number for more than 2 years can easily top 100,000. While the pending cases overall had increased 40% from 2006 to 2007, (alarming!), the pending cases for longer than 33 months had grown 44% (oh Heavenly God alarming!). No wonder the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman gasped “disturbing” in his report. Actually, the eldly psychopath in SAW series is disturbing; the delay of FBI Name Check is simply CATASTROPHIC!

It is impossible to quantify how much damage (physical, emotional and financial) the FBI Name Check has done to the legal immigrants like you and me (we simply know it is enormous and utterly inhumane), the only thing IS quantifiable is that the great FBI Name Check Program has never caught a single terrorist. These terrorists either are not stupid enough to apply for Green Card, or, if they are stupid enough to apply, are in the pending status forever, ironically, at the benefit of FBI Name Check delay. They are praying for God that the FBI could never complete their name check (BTW, which is exactly what FBI is doing), sipping their Starbucks, and planning their next attack. They may even leave a Thank You note to the FBI Name Check program when they are ready.

So why do we need to suffer? You ask the right question, but unfortunately, there is no right answer, only a solution or two worthy your time and energy.