According to the official, as of last week there were 74,274 primary applicants in the pipeline for the SIV, a visa designed for those who worked for the US government during two decades of involvement in the war in Afghanistan. That number includes those who have not yet passed the head of mission (COM) application stage — a critical point in whether or not a visa will be approved — and the senior administration official said 40-50 percent of those in the COM stage were rejected “due to lack of proper documentation or ineligibility for various reasons”.
There are about 10,000 core applicants who have the head of mission’s approval “and are basically getting ready to get their documents so they can be moved,” the official told reporters. This number does not include about 40,000-50,000 family members.
The SIV program for Afghan nationals has been plagued by management problems and low annual limits for years, leading to the withdrawal of US forces. This is often a cumbersome and meticulous process and can take years to complete.
The official said processing of SIVs is moving faster than before, noting that the State Department has increased resources to handle the processing.
Senior administration officials also announced they were eliminating one of the two forms for most new applicants, a process change they said “will cut about a month off the time for a court decision.” The elimination of this form means that all processing will be done by the State Department and no longer through USCIS. However, it will be a very rigorous process.
During the US withdrawal from the country last year, the Biden administration faced sharp criticism for its handling of the SIV, which had trouble leaving the country quickly amid the chaos of the Taliban takeover. Late last year, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken launched a 90-day review of the State Department’s role in the withdrawal from Afghanistan. This report has been completed, but none of its findings have been published.
“We don’t have an update to provide at this time, but, as we’ve said, we will be as transparent as possible with the final report, consistent with classification and other considerations,” a State Department spokesperson told CNN.
Blinken and DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas announced the change in a statement Monday, saying it “will simplify and streamline the application process for Afghan applicants.”
“Starting this week, new applicants to the Afghan SIV program will need to submit only one form, a revised Form DS-157, as their SIV petition. New applicants will no longer need to file Form I-360, Petition for Special Immigrant Status, with DHS’s US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS),” they said. “This new streamlined process, which is part of our ongoing efforts to make the program more efficient, will help remove barriers for applicants and reduce application times.”
“This change does not reduce or eliminate any of the robust security screening processes required before the benefit is provided,” they added, calling it “one of many steps we have taken to improve the SIV process while protecting the national security”.
“Since the beginning of the Administration, we have increased resources for this vital program and reviewed every stage of the legally required application process to streamline it where possible,” Blinken and Mayorkas said.
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