Close to thirty immigration attorneys told The New York Times that federal agencies are blacking out or withholding the paperwork their clients need to prove they are legally allowed to remain in the United States, and in some cases officials claim records simply do not exist even when lawyers know otherwise. This is a request people file by the hundreds of thousands each year, and the gap between a complete file and a blacked-out page can decide whether someone stays in the country or gets deported.
- A former senior USCIS records official, later identified as Timothy Turner, told Congress the agency ordered staff in May 2025 to withhold tax returns, court transcripts, joint bank records, marriage certificates and any document not written in English.
- Attorney Gregory Luce's own case data shows more than 80 percent of his adoptee clients' files came back redacted or withheld after April 17, 2025, up from a 10 percent average the twelve months before that date.
- A 2020 federal court order in Nightingale v. USCIS gives the agency 20 to 30 business days to answer records requests, yet a leaked internal email described a way to close cases and count them as resolved without ever producing the files.
- Cipriano Alarcon-Galvez, 54, faces a deportation hearing in December while USCIS tells him his appeal will not be decided until May 2027.
