Why is this collection necessary and what are the legal statutes that allow this?
The U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), as amended by the Refugee Act of 1980, allows for the admission as refugees of persons of special humanitarian concern to the United States who can establish that they have suffered past persecution or have a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion. See INA §§ 101(a)(42) and 207; 8 U.S.C. §§ 1101(a)(42) and 1157. The law also provides for resettlement assistance to be provided to arriving refugees, including initial reception and placement with a voluntary public or private nonprofit agency serving as a sponsor. See INA § 412; 8 U.S.C. § 1522. Biographical information is collected from each refugee applicant in order to initiate resettlement processing, to run security checks by the law enforcement and intelligence communities before the refugee can be approved to travel to the United States, to conduct an adjudication interview on refugee admissibility by a United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) officer, to place him or her with a resettlement agency at an appropriate resettlement site if admitted to the United States, and to plan and conduct international travel for the refugee applicant to the United States.
What business purpose is the information gathered going to be used for?
This information is collected at refugee processing locations abroad during a personal intake process with the applicant using, for the most part, already pre-approved Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Department of State (State) collections (OMB 1115-0057, OMB 1615-0008, and OMB 1615-0097). The recipient of the information is generally an employee of a nonprofit or international organization that has a cooperative agreement or a memorandum of understanding with the State Department to perform this service at a Resettlement Support Center. The data collected includes a refugee applicant’s personal characteristics such as date and place of birth, gender, contact information, marital status, family ties, religion, ethnic group, background, education, occupation, skills, medical information, English language ability, associated family members’ refugee resettlement cases and identity documents. The data is transmitted to federal law enforcement and intelligence community partners to run security checks on refugee applicants before they can be permitted to travel to the United States. The data is also used to produce forms USCIS requires to interview and adjudicate the refugee claim. Data is also given to resettlement agencies at a weekly allocation meeting, as well as to the International Organization for Migration to conduct a medical screening and plan international travel. Resettlement agencies use the data to place each refugee in an appropriate resettlement location in the United States. If the data were not collected, refugees could not be properly vetted by the intelligence and law enforcement community or have their case adjudicated by USCIS, and therefore refugee applicants could no longer be processed through the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP). In addition, the resettlement agencies would not be able to provide appropriate initial reception and placement services as provided for in the Refugee Act.
Is this collection able to be completed electronically (e.g. through a website or application)?
There is no form associated with this data collection for all applicants. However, the State Department plans to pilot on-line data collection for applicants in certain locations in the near future. The applicants verbally provide the information during the intake process and may submit personal records in support of their statements. The State Department has developed an automated data capture system called START that is in use at processing locations for electronic transmission of the data to the Refugee Processing Center, which permits faster dissemination of the information to the vetting partners and resettlement agencies. This system fully replaced the Worldwide Refugee Admissions Processing System (WRAPS) in 2022, allowing for more effective and efficient electronic management of refugee resettlement cases. The Department has designed this data collection to make most efficient use of digital data capture. While this does not represent a complete end-to-end electronic process, it equates to paperwork reduction by incorporation of the electronic entry of intake responses.
Does this collection duplicate any other collection of information?
There is no duplication of collection. Some information is available on other forms necessary for the processing of refugees, but all the required information is not available on other forms. It is more efficient to collect the complete data needed by the intelligence and federal law enforcement community and resettlement agencies at one time than it would be to collect partial data and then search other completed forms for the remaining information.
The information collection does not involve small businesses or other small entities.
What are the consequences if this collection is not done?
Failure to collect refugee applicant data would impede the ability of the intelligence and federal law enforcement community to properly vet refugees, USCIS to adjudicate refugee claims, and resettlement agencies to place refugees in appropriate resettlement locations in the United States.
The data is collected by the Resettlement Support Center only once for each refugee. Updates are also recorded if there are changes to the data during resettlement processing.
The State Department Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration published a 60-day notice on December 8, 2020, to solicit public comments for this collection. See 85 FR 79068. One comment was received.
The commenter stated: “I agree that more accurate data on refugees will make their resettlement more efficient. Also, it seems useful for security reasons. The problem, however, is that implementing this policy may not be feasible since it requires many partners oversees. Also, the data may not be useful since usually the information provided by refugees is not base [sic] on official records, so there is no way to measure their accuracy.”
The commenter did not offer any recommended changes to the current data collection process; therefore, no changes will be made to the data collection process to address this comment.
Respondents receive neither payments nor gifts for providing their biodata. While U.S. Government refugee resettlement benefits in the United States are the same for every refugee, resettlement agencies might identify additional, non-U.S. Government resources based in part upon needs that are identified through a review of the data provided.
Respondents are notified how applicant data may be used for case processing through a Notice of Confidentiality that all applicants sign at the beginning of the process. This includes notification that the information in their files is released to, among other individuals, State Department personnel, officers of other federal agencies including the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and (DHS), and resettlement agency employees on a need-to-know basis. Disclosure of information is restricted in accordance with provisions of the cooperative agreements, a memorandum of understanding between the resettlement agencies and the State Department, and the Notice on Confidentiality.
Information on religion and ethnic group is provided at the option of the applicant, but it can be useful for validating a refugee applicant’s persecution claim, as well as determining which resettlement site might be best suited for a refugee. For example, a Jewish refugee might prefer to be located in a city with a synagogue. This placement could not be assured if the applicant had not indicated their religion during the collection of biographical data. Applicants are also provided the option of disclosing their sexual orientation for the purpose of determining the resettlement site which might be best suited for the applicant.
Describe the hour time burden and the hour cost burden on the respondent needed to complete this collection.
The State Department estimates that up to 125,000 individuals will be admitted into the United States through the USRAP in FY 2024. Each individual, along with their family members on their case, provides the requested information only once. However, based upon our experiences in collecting this data over a number of years, we estimate that more than 125,000 individuals will participate, whether or not they are granted admission to the United States. Based on the above estimate, we are predicting approximately 200,000 case collection interviews in FY 2024. Typically, it takes approximately three hours per refugee case to collect the necessary data from each family member. The total hour burden is estimated to be 600,000 hours (200,000 responses per case x three hours estimated completion time per case = 600,000 hours). Please note that due to refugee applicants’ circumstances, we estimate the majority of them do not work, and, therefore, PRM is unable to calculate the hour cost burden because many refugees are unemployed.
Describe the monetary burden to respondents (out of pocket costs) needed to complete this collection.
There is no cost to the individual who provides biographical information. The USRAP is free to all applicants. However, some applicants must pay transport costs to get to their processing appointments. This varies based on location.
Annualized cost to the Federal Government is approximately $9,000,000. Please see chart below. This is based upon an average hourly salary of a Resettlement Support Center worker of $15; data collection time of three hours per refugee case; and 200,000 case collection interviews (for 125,000 total refugees estimated for admission) in FY 2024.
Refugee Cases |
RSC Hourly Salary |
Biographic Data Gathering Time |
Total |
200,000 |
$15/per hour |
3 hours |
$9,000,000 |
The number of hours reported on our last submission was 30,372, based on the 10,124 refugee cases that we anticipated collecting data from in FY 2021. However, the number of hours being reported in this submission is 600,000 based on the 200,000 refugee cases we anticipate collecting this data from in FY 2024. The number of refugee admissions varies each fiscal year, guided by the ceiling set in the annual Presidential Determination, but which may also be affected by the U.S. Government’s and State Department’s financial resources and refugee processing capacity.
The results of this collection will not be published.
Relevant officers and employees will inform applicants of the expiration date of the collection.
There are no exceptions to this certification statement.
This collection does not employ statistical methods.
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 2024-07-22 |