United States General Accounting Office 

Washington, DC 20548 

October 17, 2003 

Congressional Committees 

Subject: Immigration Benefits: Tenth Report Required by the Haitian Refugee 

Immigration Fairness Act of 1998 

This report responds to certain requirements of the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness 

Act (HRIFA) of 19981

 that authorized certain Haitian nationals and their dependents to apply 

to adjust their status to legal permanent residence. Section 902(k) of the act requires the 

Comptroller General to report every 6 months on the number of Haitian nationals who have 

applied and been approved to adjust their status to legal permanent residence. The reports 

are to contain a breakdown of the number of Haitians who applied and the number who were 

approved as asylum applicants, parolees, children without parents, orphaned children, or 

abandoned children; or as the eligible dependents of these applicants, including spouses, 

children, and unmarried sons or daughters. Reports are to be provided until all applications 

have been finally adjudicated. This is our tenth report.2 

Results in Brief 

Through September 30, 2003, the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services (BCIS), 

formerly part of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), had received a total of 

37,851 HRIFA applications and had approved 11,067of these applications.

3

 The Executive 

Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) had 1,094 applications filed and had approved 273 of 

them. Details on the categories of the applicants and approvals are provided in this report. 

1

P.L. 105-277, 112 Stat. 2681-538. 2

The previous reports were (1) U.S. General Accounting Office, Immigration Benefits: Applications for Adjustment of Status 

Under the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act of 1998, GAO/GGD-99-92R (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 21, 1999); 

(2) Immigration Benefits: Second Report Required by the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act of 1998, 

GAO/GGD-00-25R (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 19, 1999); (3) Immigration Benefits: Third Report Required by the Haitian Refugee 

Immigration Fairness Act of 1998, GAO/GGD-00-122R (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 14, 2000); (4) Immigration Benefits: Fourth 

Report Required by the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act of 1998, GAO-01-118R (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 20, 2000); 

(5) Immigration Benefits: Fifth Report Required by the Haitian Immigration Fairness Act of 1998, GAO-01-651R 

(Washington, D.C.: Apr. 20, 2001); (6) Immigration Benefits: Sixth Report Required by the Haitian Immigration Fairness Act 

of 1998, GAO-02-114R (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 22, 2001); (7) Immigration Benefits: Seventh Report Required by the Haitian 

Immigration Fairness Act of 1998, GAO-02-600R (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 18, 2002); (8) Immigration Benefits: Eighth Report 

Required by the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act of 1998, GAO-03-240R (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 22, 2002); and (9) 

Immigration Benefits: Ninth Report Required by the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act of 1998, GAO-03-681R 

(Washington, D.C.: Apr. 21, 2003). 3

On March 1, 2003, INS was transferred from the Department of Justice to the Department of Homeland Security. Within 

Homeland Security, the adjudication of HRIFA benefits is the responsibility of BCIS. 

GAO-04-189R Immigration Benefits 
Background 

Haitian applicants are to send their applications to BCIS’s Nebraska Service Center in 

Lincoln, Nebraska. A contractor at the service center is responsible for processing the 

applications up to the point of their adjudication by BCIS examiners. An application may be 

adjudicated at the service center or in a BCIS district with jurisdiction over the area where 

the alien applicant resides. Generally, applications that are complete and evidentially 

sufficient can be adjudicated at the service center, according to BCIS officials. If an interview 

is required or other issues need to be resolved, the application is to be forwarded to the 

appropriate BCIS district where the applicant can be interviewed and the application 

adjudicated. Data on Haitian applicants are to be entered in BCIS’s Computer Linked 

Application Information System (CLAIMS). 

Haitian nationals who are eligible for HRIFA should file their applications with EOIR rather 

than BCIS if they have (1) a proceeding pending before the Immigration Court or the Board of 

Immigration Appeals or (2) a pending motion to reopen or reconsider filed on or before May 

12, 1999. Thus, Haitian nationals who are in deportation, exclusion, or removal proceedings, 

and whose cases have not been administratively closed, are to file their HRIFA application 

with EOIR, not BCIS.4

 Data on Haitian applicants are to be entered in EOIR’s case-tracking 

system, the Automated Nationwide System for Immigration Review (ANSIR). 

The deadline for principal applicants filing an application for adjustment of status under 

HRIFA was March 31, 2000. Dependents of principal applicants have no application deadline.5 

HRIFA Applications Received and Approved by BCIS 

Through September 30, 2003, BCIS data showed that it had received 37,851 HRIFA 

applications at its Nebraska Service Center, all of which had been entered into CLAIMS. The 

categories and numbers of these applicants are shown in table 1. Through September 30, 

2003, BCIS had approved 11,067applications for adjustment of status under HRIFA. 

Table 1: HRIFA Applications and Categories of Applications Received and Approved by BCIS, through 

September 30, 2003 

Principal or 

dependent Category of applicant 

Number of 

applications in 

CLAIMS 

Number of 

applications 

approved 

Principal Asylum 17,324 5,992 

Principal Parolee 8,899 2,611 

Principal Child without parents 1,228 121 

Principal Orphaned child 240 25 

Principal Abandoned child 480 24 

Dependent Spouse 3,414 745 

Dependent Child 5,931 1,474 

Dependent Unmarried son or daughter 335 75 

Total 37,851 11,067 

Source: BCIS data. 

4

EOIR was not transferred to Homeland Security and remains part of the Department of Justice. 5

The Legal Immigration and Family Equity Act (title XI of P.L. 106-553, as amended by title XV of P.L. 106-554) went into effect 

on December 21, 2000. This act amended HRIFA to waive certain grounds of inadmissibility for aliens applying for relief under 

HRIFA. Interim regulations implementing these changes to HRIFA went into effect on May 31, 2001. 

Page 2 GAO-04-189R Immigration Benefits 
HRIFA Applications Filed with and Approved by EOIR 

Through September 30, 2003, EOIR data from ANSIR showed that 1,094 HRIFA applications 

had been filed with EOIR, of which 273 had been approved for adjustment of status. Table 2 

provides information on the categories and numbers of HRIFA applicants and approvals. 

Table 2: HRIFA Applications and Categories of Applications Filed with and Approved by EOIR, through 

September 30, 2003 

Principal or 

dependent Category of applicant 

Number of 

applications in 

ANSIR 

Number of 

applications 

approved 

Principal Asylum 629 145 

Principal Parolee 281 66 

Principal Child without parents 50 22 

Principal Orphaned child 7 4 

Principal Abandoned child 6 3 

Dependent Spouse 75 21 

Dependent Child 39 9 

Dependent Unmarried son or daughter 7 3 

Total 1,094 273 

Source: EOIR data. 

Objectives, Scope, and Methodology 

Our objectives for this report were to determine (1) the number and categories of applicants 


who filed applications with BCIS or EOIR and (2) the number and categories of applicants 


whose applications were approved by BCIS or EOIR. To attain these objectives, we relied on 


BCIS and EOIR to provide us with data on applicants and the number of approvals. We did 


not independently verify the data provided by BCIS or EOIR. We conducted our work 


between September and October 2003, in accordance with generally accepted government 


auditing standards. 


We provided the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security with a draft of this report for 


comment and received their informal comments on October 15, 2003. BCIS and EOIR had no 


comments on the report.


We are sending copies of this letter to the Attorney General and the Secretary of the 


Department of Homeland Security and will make copies available to others upon request. The 


letter is also available on GAO’s home page at http://www.gao.gov. If you have any questions 


about this report, please contact me at (202) 512-8777. The key contributor to this assignment 


was Anthony L. Hill. 


Laurie E. Ekstrand 


Director, Homeland Security 


and Justice Issues 


(440254)


Page 3 GAO-04-189R Immigration Benefits 
List of Congressional Committees 

The Honorable Ted Stevens 


Chairman 


The Honorable Robert C. Byrd 


Ranking Minority Member 


Committee on Appropriations 


United States Senate 


The Honorable Orrin G. Hatch 


Chairman 


The Honorable Patrick J. Leahy 


Ranking Minority Member 


Committee on the Judiciary 


United States Senate 


The Honorable C.W. Bill Young 


Chairman 


The Honorable David R. Obey 


Ranking Minority Member 


Committee on Appropriations 


House of Representatives 


The Honorable F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr. 


Chairman 


The Honorable John Conyers, Jr. 


Ranking Minority Member 


Committee on the Judiciary 


House of Representatives 


Page 4 GAO-04-189R Immigration Benefits