The rule was filed this morning and publishes tomorrow, and its own summary is the clearest statement of what it does.
'DHS is amending its regulations to permit USCIS to refer certain affirmative asylum applications to [the Executive Office for Immigration Review] without interview,' it reads. Then: 'DHS is also removing the requirement that a letter communicating the basis for referral of asylum include an assessment of the alien's credibility' [1].
Two changes, and the second is the quieter one. The first removes the interview. The second removes the obligation to write down what the government concluded about whether the applicant was telling the truth.
The numbers are the department's own. 'Approximately 132,167 aliens seeking affirmative asylum annually may be referred without interview.' And, of the existing backlog, 'up to 444,724 (31 percent) of the 1,434,145 cases' [1]. The arithmetic checks: 444,724 divided by 1,434,145 is 31.01 percent.
The backlog is real and DHS is candid about it. More than 1.4 million affirmative asylum applications remained pending at USCIS at the end of fiscal 2025, and applicants 'may wait over 7.3 years for resolution' [1]. A seven-year wait for a protection decision is its own kind of denial, and any government would want to fix it.
The mechanism is what deserves attention. This is an interim final rule - it takes effect on publication and comments are collected afterward, the reverse of the usual order.
The rule also contains a tension worth putting on the record: its summary asserts that 'USCIS still offers an interview prior to a grant or denial of asylum,' while the operative provision is referral without one [1]. Both sentences are in the same document.
