Prepared Floor Speech of Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa
Ranking Member, Senate Judiciary Committee
Mayorkas Failed to Fix National Security Concerns
Thursday, December 19, 2013
Just two days ago I was on this floor explaining the concerns I have with Mr. Mayorkas’s nomination. I have additional information for my colleagues.
Today, the Office of Inspector General, or OIG, for the Department of Homeland Security released an embargoed version of its audit of the EB-5 immigrant investor visa program. The report states that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has difficulty ensuring the integrity of the program and does not always ensure that regional centers meet all eligibility requirements.
Specifically, it said:
“U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services did not always enforce its own regulations and procedures to assist with managing the regional center program.”
“Until improvements are made, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services is unable to prevent fraud and national security threats. . .”
“[I]t cannot report the results of the program accurately or ensure the EB-5 program is benefiting the U.S. economy and creating jobs for U.S. citizens as created by Congress.”
You understand that Mr. Mayorkas is in charge of this program.
The IG said that the agency needed to improve coordination and rely on the expertise of other agencies.
The IG had several recommendations for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services that, frankly, should have been in place before now if the director was doing his job.
In his comments on the draft report, Mr. Mayorkas claimed that he was already addressing the issues the OIG raised. He said his agency had “dramatically enhanced collaboration with key government partners,” such as the FBI. He also wrote that when his agency has concerns with EB-5 cases, it doesn’t decide the cases until it has “fully coordinated its approach with enforcement and intelligence partners.”
I’ve seen examples of this so-called coordination Mr. Mayorkas talks about.
But again, his words don’t comport with the actual practice.
When Homeland Security’s law enforcement database, TECS, has a hit on someone applying for a regional center, Citizenship and Immigration Services sends an email to the law enforcement agency that put the record in.
But, the problem is that Citizenship and Immigration Services isn’t waiting for law enforcement.
In fact, information has come to my attention that Citizenship and Immigration Services employees are told to move forward if law enforcement doesn’t respond in five days.
That’s just five days to find out what sensitive security or fraud information caused that person to be flagged. If law enforcement doesn’t get back to Citizenship and Immigration Services soon enough, they just go ahead and approve the person’s application.
That’s not coordination—it’s a sham. It should be simply unacceptable to any of us who are concerned about the national security of our country.
It is not the sort of way to run a program with national security vulnerabilities. You should wait until the law enforcement responds. You need to know who's coming into this country, particularly when they're involved in a program where you buy your way into a country by supposedly investing and creating jobs in this country. Some people may want to get into this country for ulterior motives, and it may violate our national security. They don't care about creating jobs. If the visa gets them inside the country, you need to know if they're a threat to our national security.
The only reason that US Citizenship and Immigration Services even does checks on regional centers at all is because of a push within the agency that Mr. Mayorkas and his management resisted. Now they’re trying to take credit for it.
More important is what his agency has not done. They refuse to kick out regional centers that invite national security problems.
Mr. Mayorkas claims he doesn’t have statutory authority, but the OIG audit recommended that Mr. Mayorkas should make clear on his own that fraud and national security concerns are a reason for regional centers to be kicked out of the program.
The bottom line is that Mr. Mayorkas has not taken the steps that were within his power to guard against security vulnerabilities in the EB-5 program.
The OIG audit report concludes: “Currently, USCIS cannot administer and manage the EB-5 regional center program effectively.”
Mr. Mayorkas has had ample notice of these problems for years. He has failed to take adequate action.