Trump administration mandates enhanced security checks for immigration applicants

The Trump administration is subjecting broad categories of immigrants applying for legal immigration benefits to enhanced security checks, and is pausing some cases while the changes are implemented, according to internal government documents obtained by CBS News. Last week, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services distributed internal guidance instructing its officers to resubmit pending applications for different immigration benefits, including asylum, green cards and U.S. citizenship, to enhanced FBI background checks, the documents show. Officers were directed to refrain from approving any pending cases that have not undergone the expanded background checks. USCIS has long used FBI databases to vet immigration applications for potential national security or public safety concerns. But the documents indicate the enhanced security screenings were prompted by the FBI's decision to grant USCIS greater access to its criminal history database, as part of an executive order by President Trump in February. That order directed the Justice Department, which oversees the FBI, to provide USCIS access to its criminal history database "to the maximum extent permitted by law" to identify criminal actors. …