Biden administration plans to revive asylum program despite evidence of widespread fraud: report

The Biden administration may revive an asylum program that was halted due to "mass fraud," despite ongoing investigations into thousands of potentially fraudulent claims.

The Biden administration may revive a program that enables migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela to apply for entry and temporary work authorization, despite DHS discovering that many applications submitted under the program were fraudulent, according to a report from NBC News.

Last month, the program, which was launched last year, was temporarily paused to allow DHS to conduct a review of sponsor applications of U.S. residents who legally reside in the U.S. and pledge their financial support to migrants to come live in the United States.

According to an internal DHS report reviewed by NBC News, out of the approximately 101,000 sponsor applications submitted under the program, 3,218 were filed by "serial sponsors," who used the same address, IP address, or phone number on their applications.

In one review by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), a DHS division, nearly 600 applications were flagged due to the use of an Orlando, Florida commercial warehouse address. Additionally, the review uncovered instances of the same Social Security numbers being used multiple times, some of which belonged to deceased individuals.

The report does not specify the number of sponsored applicants who entered the U.S., but it has previously raised concerns about human trafficking when a small number of sponsors are used for large groups of people.

Officials hope to restart the program as soon as possible, believing its availability would discourage migrants from crossing the U.S. border illegally, according to a report citing an official source.

The program pause has resulted in approximately 30,000 applications that require review, and it is unlikely that all of these reviews will be completed before the program is reinstated.

In April, USCIS initiated a review following a "filing trend analysis" by its internal fraud detection unit, which identified thousands of red flags in applications, prompting concerns about potential fraud. Yet, it remains uncertain how many of these potentially fraudulent applications were eventually approved.

The review discovered a troubling pattern from nine IP addresses that were supporting a disproportionate number of women compared to men, with one IP address sponsoring 18 females, 14 of whom were minors.

The revived program will have a new procedure for vetting sponsors, with any suspected fraud cases being investigated, according to a U.S. government official who spoke to NBC News.

Neither the White House nor DHS provided a response to Planet Chronicle Digital's request for comment.