JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
Last year, the Trump administration began slowing down illegal immigration. It paused reviewing some applications, like for work permits, and increased scrutiny of anyone applying for citizenship. The result is that the line to get permission to legally work and live in the U.S. is the longest it's been in decades. NPR's Homeland Security correspondent Ximena Bustillo is here to tell us more. Hi.
XIMENA BUSTILLO, BYLINE: Hey, Juana.
SUMMERS: Ximena, let's start by talking about naturalizations for people to become citizens. What did that look like last year?
BUSTILLO: Well, there were a lot of ups and downs as far as people wanting to apply for citizenship. The number of applications submitted stayed generally steady, about 70- to 90,000 a month, but until October. That's when they doubled to 169,000 and then immediately fell off. By January of this year, there was almost a 50% drop in the normal amount of people applying to become a citizen.
SUMMERS: OK. That's a lot of fluctuation. What caused the sudden increase and drop?
BUSTILLO: Well, the timing coincides with several new policies going into effect. These are things like tougher citizenship tests and deeper vetting. My colleague Anusha Mathur went to a few citizenship ceremonies. At one of them, she met Johanan Rivera (ph) from Mexico. After 15 years here, he applied to naturalize last year.
JOHANAN RIVERA: The second Trump administration came into office, and we wanted more certainty about being able to live in the same country. It's been a result of political change in the U.S. that I think has pushed forward the process.
BUSTILLO: Lawyers said that there are many people like Rivera who saw the administrations tough on immigration policies and wanted to secure their status, but by the end of the year, the number of applications dropped as it became tougher to get citizenship.
SUMMERS: OK. So that's the trend with applications. What about the number of people approved for citizenship?
BUSTILLO: So at first, the Trump administration was naturalizing many people. More people were naturalized each March, April and May of 2025 than any month of 2024 when former President Joe Biden was in office. But again, we start to see that drop off in October. That's partly because of new restrictions placed on citizenship applications. And the administration paused all immigration processes for people from one of 39 travel ban countries. The agency said that it wanted to take more time to vet these applications for national security purposes. And that resulted in fewer people getting any decision.
SUMMERS: So by the end of the year, fewer people were applying, and fewer people were getting a decision on their application. Are we seeing these trends beyond citizenship?
BUSTILLO: Essentially, the line to be a legal immigrant or a citizen has gotten longer. So right now, there's nearly 12 million applications awaiting a decision, and that's for citizenship, work permits or other permissions to live and work in the United States. And that includes about 247,000 applications that have physically not even been opened by the agency. Immigration attorneys like Luis Cortes Romero said that he's helping clients brace for this impact.
LUIS CORTES ROMERO: They need to be prepared about potentially having a lapse in their ability to have a work permit. And that oftentimes means being laid off or being paused from going to work and being unable to make a living.
SUMMERS: I mean, those are some pretty serious consequences. Are these people at risk of deportation as they wait?
BUSTILLO: Yes, they are. Cortes Romero said that if his clients can have proof that their application is under review, then an immigration judge or even an immigration enforcement officer can hold off on deporting them. But for those 247,000, they can't prove that until the agency acknowledges their application. So that means more people could be at risk of being detained while they wait.
SUMMERS: NPR's Ximena Bustillo, thank you.
BUSTILLO: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
