The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has placed staff from the Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman on administrative leave, effectively shutting down an office that has helped thousands of immigrants resolve problems with their visa and green card applications.
What Happened
On March 21, 2025, DHS put all staff from the USCIS Ombudsman office on 60-day administrative leave. The same action affected two other oversight offices: the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties and the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman. While this doesn’t officially close these offices, many experts see it as a step toward major restructuring or possible closure.
What is the Ombudsman Office?
Congress created the CIS Ombudsman position through the Homeland Security Act of 2002. The law gives this office the specific job of helping people resolve problems with USCIS, identifying patterns of issues, and recommending improvements to how immigration benefits are processed.
DHS says it wants to streamline operations to focus on border security and immigration enforcement and claims these oversight offices have slowed down immigration enforcement.
Immigration advocates disagree, pointing out that USCIS mainly processes immigration benefits applications—it’s not primarily an enforcement agency.
Impact on Immigrants
The suspension of the USCIS Ombudsman office impacts many types of immigrants who have relied on this resource:
- H-1B visa holders: When facing delays that threatened their legal status, these workers have turned to the Ombudsman for help. In documented cases, H-1B extension applications that had been stuck for months were resolved within weeks after the Ombudsman stepped in.
- International students on F-1 visas: Students with problems getting Optional Practical Training (OPT) or STEM OPT extensions have sought help from the Ombudsman when their applications were incorrectly handled or denied.
- Green card applicants: The Ombudsman’s office has helped resolve stalled green card applications, especially those complicated by background check issues or processing errors.
According to the 2024 USCIS Ombudsman Annual Report, the office handled about 30,000 requests for help in 2023. These included fixing wrong rejections, correcting errors on important documents, and solving mailing problems.
What This Means Now
With the Ombudsman’s office staff on leave:
- Reports suggest that pending cases may no longer be processed, though there’s been no official announcement about this.
- People with urgent immigration issues may need to find other ways to get help, such as contacting their congressional representatives who can ask federal agencies about constituents’ cases.
- The loss of this independent problem-solving channel means more people may need to rely on congressional offices and advocacy groups.
- No plan has been announced for handling the types of cases the Ombudsman’s office previously resolved.
Critics—including immigration advocates, legal organizations, and Democratic lawmakers—worry that shutting down these offices will reduce accountability and transparency in the immigration system. Many stress the importance of independent oversight to ensure fair treatment of immigrants. Democratic Senate committee members have pointed out that the Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Office is required by law. The Ombudsman’s office was valuable because it operated independently from USCIS and could objectively check whether the agency was following its own rules and procedures.
What to Do If You’re Affected
If you had a case with the USCIS Ombudsman or were planning to seek their help:
- Contact your congressional representative: Your elected officials can ask USCIS about delayed or problematic cases on your behalf.
- Talk to an immigration attorney: Professional legal advice is especially important now for navigating complex immigration issues.
- Keep detailed records: Document all communications with USCIS, including dates, reference numbers, and the names of people you speak with.
- Consider premium processing: If available for your application type and if you can afford it, premium processing may help avoid long delays.
Legal Challenges and Broader Context
While no lawsuits directly challenging the suspension of DHS oversight offices have been reported as of April 2025, related legal actions are addressing other immigration changes:
- Nonprofits sue over funding cuts: Several nonprofit organizations have filed a lawsuit (Solutions In Hometown Connections v. Noem) challenging DHS’s decision to freeze grant funding for immigration services. They argue the freeze is unlawful, has forced organizations to lay off staff, and has cut programs that help immigrants. The organizations are asking courts to restore their funding.
- Legal aid groups contest program suspensions: Advocacy groups have sued (Amica Center for Immigrant Rights et al. v. DOJ) after the government stopped programs that provide legal resources to immigrants facing deportation. In February 2025, a court temporarily allowed these programs to continue while the case moves forward, though the government is appealing this decision.
Legal experts believe more lawsuits may follow, as the suspension of oversight offices like the USCIS Ombudsman creates gaps in the system that could potentially affect immigrants’ rights. However, the current focus of court cases is on specific programs being cut rather than on the office suspensions themselves.
Boundless Immigration will continue to monitor developments and provide updates as new information becomes available.