Blunt joins colleagues in requesting USCIS briefing on furloughs

The furloughs of roughly 800 contract employees in the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ (USCIS) Kansas and Missouri offices prompted U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) and several of his colleagues to request that the agency provide them with a briefing.

USCIS recently reduced contract personnel at the National Benefit Center offices, which employ approximately 1,300 contract employees between the Missouri and Kansas facilities. Overall, USCIS has 3,100 contract and federal employees in the bi-state region who conduct pre-processing steps, run background checks, and prepare applications for interviews at field offices around the country, according to an Aug. 31 letter Sen. Blunt and his colleagues sent to USCIS Deputy Director for Policy Joseph Edlow.

“The National Benefit Center provides critical support to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and has a significant impact on the local economy,” Sen. Blunt said on Monday. “USCIS’ decision comes at an already extremely difficult time for these workers and their families. I hope this briefing will help inform our efforts to find a resolution to this issue as soon as possible.”

Sen. Blunt and his colleagues, who included U.S. Sens. Jerry Moran (R-KS) and Pat Roberts (R-KS) and U.S. Reps. Sam Graves (R-MO) and Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO), noted that “were it not for the hard work of these dedicated individuals, the Kansas City Metropolitan region would not have grown into the diverse community it is today and the economic impact of such a reduction will be felt for years to come.”

In order to better understand how USCIS reached the decision to furlough so many National Benefit Center contractors, the lawmakers requested the briefing for the agency to detail how the determination was made to descope the contract in the Kansas City region.

Additionally, Sen. Blunt and his colleagues want details on any changes planned for the remaining personnel, the potential impacts these changes could have on application case backlogs in various application categories, as well as the metrics that will be used to potentially restore the full contract level in the future, according to their letter.