The Department of Homeland Security has redirected all immigration officers from the Fraud Detection and National Security Directorate (FDNS), a unit within US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), to focus full-time on two initiatives identified as high-priority by the Trump administration: screening South African refugees and investigating alleged noncitizen voters.
According to internal communications obtained by the Guardian, the reassignment has prevented USCIS from providing officers for asylum officer training in the near future. FDNS officers normally work with asylum offices to identify cases requiring further investigation, detect potential fraud, and flag national security concerns in immigration applications. The message does not clarify whether the reassignment has also disrupted routine fraud screening of pending asylum applications. The processing of asylum claims has substantially slowed during the Trump administration’s second term, leaving many applicants in extended limbo.
The South African refugee screening represents a significant shift in US refugee policy. Between October 2025 and July 2026, of 10,258 refugees admitted to the United States, 10,255 were from South Africa. Administration officials have cited claims that some South Africans, particularly Afrikaners, face racial discrimination and “white genocide”—characterizations the South African government has rejected as unfounded and politically motivated.
The second priority, screening for “unlawful voters,” reflects broader administration efforts to identify noncitizens who may have registered or voted in US elections. USCIS has already moved to block naturalization for green card holders accused of voting and to initiate deportation proceedings against them. A March 2025 executive order enabled USCIS to share its database with state election officials, prompting investigations in several states. However, experts have expressed skepticism about the scope of the problem. A February 2026 review identified approximately 35 confirmed noncitizen voting cases nationwide in the 2024 general election from roughly 154 million votes cast. The DHS secretary previously claimed the department had identified over 250,000 potential noncitizen voters in four states, though confirmed numbers were later reported as substantially lower.
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