§6472 Reform of Refugee Policy

Summary

The Attorney General and the Secretary of State must make and use rules to stop bias in people abroad who work on refugee cases for the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the State Department. The rules must include training that is culturally aware and that helps create a fair, nonadversarial process. They must also require uniform steps for working with U.S.-designated refugee processing groups so case files match what applicants say and honest refugees are not hurt by bad file preparation. The Secretary of State, after talking with the Attorney General, had to issue rules within 120 days after November 29, 1999, to keep people with possible biases — including those tied to governments known for persecution — out of deciding refugee claims or interpreting papers. The President must put information about religious persecution of refugee groups into each annual report on proposed refugee admissions under section 1157(d) of title 8. The Secretary of State must include the same information when giving formal testimony to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees during the consultation under section 1157(e) of title 8.