Protesting USCIS wanting $625 for our records

Okay, I've been quiet for a really long time... a really embarrassingly long time.  I'm sorry and will try to do better, but this is something that I think is VERY important to us as genealogists and to us as Americans.  I know there's a whole lot going on right now, especially in the political arena, but please take the time to read this message.  I'll be following up with copies of e-mails to people I hoped would help, e-mails which explain why this is so incredibly important to me personally.  But anyway...


I recently saw this message from Reclaim the Records, a non-profit formed by a woman I admire very much (as should every genealogist): Brooke Schreier Ganz
 

BLACK FRIDAY SALE PRICE HIKE!
USCIS FILES TO BE 492% MORE EXPENSIVE?!

Help us stop the government from holding American history hostage!
Submit your comments to USCIS before December 16, 2019!

Hello again from Reclaim The Records! We're interrupting your probable post-Thanksgiving stupor to bring you some important and time-sensitive records access news.

Two weeks ago, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) proposed an unprecedented 492% increase in fees for researchers who want copies of historical records held by their Genealogy Program.

Yes, that did say 492%. No, it's not a typo.

This special Genealogy Program was set up about a decade ago as a way for researchers to bypass the usual tedious USCIS Freedom of Information (FOIA) requests system, which can take six months or more to respond. In return for the expedited handling for these historical files, the agency charged a bit more than the usual FOIA fees, but only enough to be recover the costs of running the program.

At least, that was how the program was supposed to work. In practice, many of the records acquired through this "streamlined" process are still sent through the FOIA redaction process anyway, delaying their access. And as for the part about recouping the program's costs, the fees were already hiked just three years ago, more than tripled in cost. It now costs researchers $65 just for a basic index search, where you send USCIS every variant and misspelling of your relative's name that you can think of, and then they search their partially digitized database for all the relevant records, and report back the record number. Then it will cost you another $65 to actually get the copies of those records.

(Note that the previous $20 fee for copies was supposedly covering the program's actual and indirect costs just fine, according to a 2012 report from the OMB (Office of Management and Budget).)

But under this brand new proposed rule change, the price of a copy of a single paper file could rise in 2020 from $65 to a whopping $625! (Okay, technically, it would "only" be $385 for the record retrieval part, if you somehow magically already knew the file number, but most researchers don't.)

  

What kinds of files are we talking about here?

The USCIS Genealogy Program provides researcher access to...

• C-Files (Naturalization Certificate Files) - Anyone who naturalized in the US between September 27, 1906 and March 31, 1956 should have a C-File.
• Form AR-2 (Alien Registration Forms) - All aliens over the age of fourteen who were residents in the US from August 1, 1940 to March 31, 1944, as well as those who immigrated within that timeframe, should have an AR-2.
• Visa Files - Most immigrants who were admitted for permanent residence between July 1, 1924 and March 31, 1944 should have a visa file, which usually includes an application with a photo and copies of vital records.
• Registry Files - The Registry Act of 1929 allowed for individuals who arrived between June 29, 1906 and July 1, 1924 and for whom no arrival could be found to legalize their arrival into the country and move forward with the naturalization process.
• And last but certainly not least, A-Files (Alien Files) - People who arrived in the US after April 1, 1944, and aliens resident in the US before that date who had subsequent contact with the INS, should have an A-File. The USCIS Genealogy Program can release these files for all A-File numbers below 8,000,000, which is those who entered the US before May 1, 1951. (More recent immigrants can get their A-File paperwork through the usual USCIS FOIA process, not this special Genealogy Program.)

Basically, any American immigrant who arrived on or after July 1, 1924 would be found in at least one of these record sets, as well as most immigrants who arrived after 1900 and lived until or past 1940. But USCIS is essentially planning to hold these records hostage, demanding researchers pay exorbitant and unjustifiable fees that have nothing to do with the actual costs of running the program.

  

Wait, why haven't these records been handed over to the National Archives yet? And why aren't they available under FOIA directly?

Great question, we're so glad you asked, because we're seriously asking the same thing. Many of these records should already be publicly accessible under the law. And USCIS' own records retention schedule says many of these records were already supposed to be turned over to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). And some of the records that they did turn over to NARA on microfilm, like the Alien Registration Forms, are still subject to USCIS restrictions!

And we at Reclaim The Records are starting the process of talking to our awesome crew of lawyers to see what we can do about this mess, from a legal point of view.

(Seriously, a situation where there's millions and millions of massively important genealogy records weirdly not being available under FOIA and being made functionally unavailable to the public just so a government agency can unjustly profit off their exclusive access is like totally completely exactly our specialty!)

But in the meantime, as long as these files remain stuck at USCIS, they're targeted for this newly proposed and totally unreasonable fee hike.

  

Introducing 'Records, Not Revenue'

So we're writing this newsletter to you guys because while we investigate our possible legal options, there is still a chance that we can all stop this new rule, this gross price gouging, from going into effect in the first place. But we have to act fast.

We at Reclaim The Records are pleased to announce that we have teamed up as part of an ad hoc non-partisan group of fellow genealogists, historians, and records access advocates, to try to stop these fee hikes. And we're starting with a website to explain what these records are, why they're important, what the USCIS Genealogy Program is, and why this price hike is totally ridiculous and unjustified.

Please check out RecordsNotRevenue.com, where you can learn about:

• The Issues: Access, Transparency, and Efficiency - Read all about the main problems with this outrageous proposal
• Who might show up in these records? - ...and why you should care about preserving public access to American history
• Check out some example files - Read real USCIS files that would be affected by this proposed fee hike
• Some conversation starters - You might want to bring these questions up in your comments

But most importantly, make sure you submit your comments to USCIS about this proposed fee hike by December 16, 2019. That's not too far away. If you're as mad about this totally needless and unjustifiable and sudden and awful fee hike on our history, as we are, we hope you'll submit your comments to them today. All the instructions are right there on the website, including a postal mail address in case a good old fashioned letter is more your style.

Thanks for reading, and we hope we'll see your comments in the Federal Register.

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