The Trump administration enacted a rule on Tuesday, July 28, 2026, allowing U. S.
Citizenship and Immigration Services to bypass initial officer interviews and send asylum applicants directly to immigration court for deportation proceedings.
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Federal officials designed the immediate measure to reduce the nation's 1.4 million pending asylum backlog by nearly a third, expecting the change to impact roughly 440,000 cases.
Under previous guidelines, USCIS officers personally interviewed applicants, reviewed evidence, and held authority to grant asylum before any court referral.
The updated rule permits authorities to skip this evaluation entirely, relying solely on written applications to transfer files to court, where Department of Homeland Security attorneys represent the government.
The policy targets claims submitted past the one-year deadline—comprising over 30 percent of backlogged cases—alongside applications deemed deficient by individual officers.
DHS projects that courts will receive approximately 132,167 new cases annually without prior interviews, affecting both new submissions and pending cases awaiting initial interviews.
Although court referral is not an immediate deportation order, immigration judges retain authority to dismiss applications without holding evidentiary hearings.
Meanwhile, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents continue arresting individuals whose cases are dismissed in court halls, while the administration has replaced over 100 immigration judges with military lawyers and former prosecutors.
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USCIS Director Defends Policy
USCIS Director Joseph Edlow defended the directive in an official statement addressing the systemic backlog.
