Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements

Permissible uses and users

SAVE can be used by agencies of governments at any level in the United States, including:

A given agency is eligible to use SAVE only if determining the immigration and nationality status of individual is necessary for its work of one of these types:

1. Determination of eligibility for a federal, state, or local public benefit
2. Issuing a license or grant
3. Issuing a government credential
4. Conducting a background investigation
5. Any other lawful purpose

In addition to these, any contractor of an agency of the above description is eligible to use SAVE if the task contracted out to them requires immigration and nationality lookups for one of the above reasons.

SAVE does not itself make determinations regarding the applicant's eligibility for a benefit or license. Rather, it simply provides an easy way to pull information about the benefit or license applicant from a variety of government databases. As discussed later, the absence of matching records in SAVE does not imply that the applicant's presence in the United States is unauthorized, or that the applicant is ineligible for the benefit. It simply means that the records accessible were not able to confirm the applicant's eligibility.

Usage by customer agencies

The general way SAVE is used is as follows. The noncitizen first submits all the necessary documentation based on the eligibility criteria for the program he or she is applying to (these eligibility criteria can vary based on the person's immigration status, the state, and the program being applied to). If this documentation in principle demonstrates the applicant's eligibility, then the caseworker at the agency can use SAVE to verify that the documentation is accurate. If Initial Verification fails, then the caseworker can (and must, if the applicant wants) submit the case for Additional Verification and then, if necessary, submit Form G-845. If the verification fails to demonstrate the validity of the documentation provided by the applicant, the applicant is not granted the benefit. The caseworker cannot use this failure to conclude that the applicant is lying about his/her status, or to use it to report the applicant to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Modes and stages of verification using SAVE

SAVE has three modes of electronic access that offer all of its basic functionality.

SAVE allows for three levels of verification for those using the system electronically.

In addition, there is also an option of pure paper-based verification, where the agency directly submits a paper Form G-845, and gets a response within 10 to 20 federal government work days. This costs the customer agency $2, compared to the total maximum charge of $1.50 if initiating the query electronically. However, this option is discouraged since the use of electronic means for Initial Verification saves time and money for all parties involved.

Initial Verification

For Initial Verification, the authorized caseworker of the customer agency needs to first log in to SAVE through the Verification Information System, after agreeing to the terms and conditions of usage. The caseworker may then choose the "Initiate Cases" tab, enter relevant information about the applicant whose status needs to be checked, and submit it. If matching records are found in the databases available to SAVE, these are returned. Some of these records may contain photos, which are also included in the response. The caseworker can respond whether the photo matches the corresponding photo submitted by the applicant or any other applicant photo. Only information related to the applicant is returned in the Initial Verification.

The Initial Verification process generally takes a few minutes (the actual search itself takes 3 to 5 seconds). The case is kept open for 180 days (so the caseworker can access the case details at any time till then, and print out if needed) after which it are closed if no action is taken during that time.

Additional Verification

If the Initial Verification provides the caseworker with all the information needed to confirm the applicant's documentation, then no additional work needs to be done. However, an Additional Verification may be instituted (electronically, through the SAVE interface) in one of these two cases:

Additional Verification can take 3 to 5 government work days. This step involves USCIS Immigration Status Verifiers making more sophisticated queries to various databases (including DHS systems and DOJ's EOIR system), to locate the applicant's records. Status Verifiers have read-only access to information contained in many other systems through the Person Centric Query System. Once the Status Verifiers have completed their search, the information is returned electronically to the caseworker through the SAVE interface.

Form G-845, Document Verification Request

If the Additional Verification fails to turn up any information, or if the Status Verifier detects discrepancies that can only be resolved by examining the applicant's documentation, SAVE provides an electronic notification to the caseworker and recommends that the caseworker submit Form G-845, Document Verification Request, with a copy of the applicant's immigration documentation. An already-filled electronic form is made available to the caseworker, who needs to print and mail it to the USCIS Immigration Status Verification Unit.

If the caseworker submits these documents, Status Verifiers conduct a more thorough search using PCQS, and may also request record corrections to the USCIS Central Index System (CIS) database by contacting the USCIS Records Division. A response should generally be returned within 20 federal working days, which is usually about one calendar month. If USCIS does not respond within that time, the caseworker can call the USCIS toll-free number to inquire into the status of the case.

Cost structure for customer agencies

Customer agencies are charged on a per-query basis, with a cost of $0.50 each for initial verification, retry, and additional verification, and a cost of $2.00 for a paper G-845 if the verification process is not initiated electronically. Billing is monthly, and there is a minimum monthly service transaction charge of $25.00 if the SAVE program is used at all, any time within the month. There is no charge during months when SAVE is not used at all. This pricing structure for SAVE has been effective since October 1, 2008. Billing is done by the USCIS's Burlington Financial Center, and methods of payment include credit card and check.

Obligations of customer agencies as agreed upon while using SAVE

For a customer agency to sign up to use SAVE, the agency must agree to SAVE's Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) (sometimes also called a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)) or Computer Matching Agreement (CMA). This covers a range of topics:

1. The customer agency agrees to responsibilities regarding safe handling of information, minimum security standards for electronic transmissions, and breach incident notification. These provisions are compliant with requirements of the Federal Information Security Management Act of 2002 (FISMA), relevant Office of Management and Budget (OMB) guidance, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Sensitive Systems Policy 4300A.
2. The customer agency agrees to various other obligations around the use of stages of verification. For instance, if the initial verification turns up no response, or if the information is inconsistent with what the applicant submitted, the agency must inform the applicant, and, if the applicant wishes to undergo additional verification, the agency must request additional verification.
3. The customer agency agrees to limit its determination of the applicant's immigration and nationality status to the limited purposes necessary for determining eligibility for the benefit.

Specific USCIS guidance on (3) is included below.

For applicants for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP; colloquially called "food stamps"):

For applicants for other programs:

Use cases

The use of SAVE is governed by a number of federal and state rules, with some rules requiring the use of SAVE for some purposes, and other rules restricting the usage of SAVE and putting limits on the way customer agencies can use the information obtained from SAVE. Note that SAVE does not usually contain information about people who were citizens since birth. It also does not offer any conclusive information regarding immigration status, but is simply a tool that helps verify documentation of status that a person submits.

Federal public benefits

Below is a list of federal public benefits where the use of SAVE is mandated for any non-citizens seeking those benefits. It is not generally used to verify citizenship status for either birthright citizens or naturalized citizens, even though SAVE usually contains information for naturalized citizens. We divide the non-citizens into four broad categories: lawful permanent residents, those in asylum/humanitarian statuses, those in lawful temporary nonimmigrant statuses, and unauthorized aliens (those who entered unlawfully or are otherwise out of status). Aliens in the first two categories are called "qualified aliens" and are eligible for some federal public benefits, whereas those in the last two categories are called "non-qualified aliens" and are ineligible for all federal public benefits except emergency medical and relief services.

In the table below, "eligible at state option" means that individual states can set rules around eligibility within that category, i.e., they can choose to either provide the benefit or deny it. Since non-qualified aliens are eligible for none of the benefits (except emergency medical services) we only include columns on the two main types of qualified aliens.

State identification cards and driver's licenses

The set of people eligible for driver's licenses and identification cards is larger than the set of people eligible for federal public benefits. In particular, anybody who is lawfully present in the United States in a long-term non-immigrant status can get a driver's license or identification card, subject to the same requirements (proof of residency, and passing the requisite age criteria and competence tests) as United States citizens. This includes:

However, those who are not in authorized status (either because they entered unlawfully, or because they have fallen out of status due to overstay or violation of the terms of their status) are not eligible for driver's licenses or identification cards. People on short-term trips, such as those who have entered using B visas, the Visa Waiver Program or border crossing cards, are also not eligible for this identification.

Unlike the case of federal public benefits, states are not mandated to use SAVE to determine eligibility for driver's licenses or identification cards. However, the REAL ID Act sets compliance standards that state-issued driver's licenses and identification cards need to meet in order to be considered identification for federal purposes, which includes travel by commercial air carriers. One of these requirements is that the immigration status of any non-citizen applying for the identification must be verified using SAVE.

Voting eligibility

In the United States, citizens are eligible to vote in federal elections, as well as in state and local elections, subject to various conditions such as those related to age and residence. Non-citizens are not eligible to vote in any federal, state, or local elections. In the late 2000s and 2010s, there have been concerns about non-citizens voting in elections. In order to address this, some state governments have considered using SAVE to help verify citizenship. However, since SAVE contains information only for naturalized citizens and not for citizens at birth (except people whose spouses immigrated), the absence of matching records in SAVE could mean that the person is a citizen or that the person's presence is unauthorized and the person has had no contact with immigration enforcement. Therefore, SAVE on its own cannot be used to make a confident determination of citizenship. For this reason, as well as the added burden of SAVE and its potential to discourage people from voting, the use of SAVE for voter eligibility has been a target for criticism.

Services for applicants

The SAVE program allows applicants for whom a verification has been initiated and is pending to check the status of their verification online, using SAVE CaseCheck through a web browser. To verify identity, the applicant needs to fill in information similar to that needed to initiate a verification, as well as the verification case number. Note that only existing pending verifications can be looked up using SAVE CaseCheck. It is not possible for a prospective applicant to use this feature preemptively, before a verification is initiated by the agency using SAVE.

SAVE also provides guidance to benefits applicants regarding what USCIS or CBP agencies to contact to request corrections in the records that SAVE uses for verification.

Sources used

SAVE relies on data updated daily through downloads from a number of agencies operating under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Below is a list of the databases from which SAVE gets daily updates:

People covered and not covered under SAVE

SAVE can be used to get information supporting the veracity of documents and status claims for naturalized citizens, lawful permanent residents who are not citizens, and people in various non-immigrant statuses.

Applicants who are United States citizens since birth usually have no presence in any of the databases accessible to SAVE, although those who have renounced their citizenship, or have otherwise come in contact with immigration enforcement may have some available data. For this reason, the absence of matching records found by SAVE cannot be used to rule out the possibility that somebody is a United States citizen.

Data not returned to the customer agency

Based on a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) between the DHS and the U.S. Department of State, passport numbers are not included in the information returned to customer agencies using SAVE. However, the data is available to Status Verifiers when using the PCQS during the first Additional Verification stage and while doing the final verification based on Document G-845.

Original mandate in the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986

The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA), Public Law 99-603, was passed by the 99th United States Congress and signed into law by then United States President Ronald Reagan. The IRCA was the original impetus for the creation of the SAVE.

The IRCA restricted access to six federal benefit programs to United States citizens, lawful permanent residents, and permanent residents under color of law (note that the jargon "federal public benefit" would be established much later, with the PRWORA). The Act required the Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS) to establish a system for verifying the immigration status of non-citizen applicants applying for these programs. The programs were:

Initial implementation of SAVE

Based on the law, INS began work on implementing SAVE, with a two-stage verification process: Primary Verification and Secondary Verification. The electronic database, known as the Alien Status Verification Index, was initially maintained by Martin Marietta on contract with the INS.

Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (abbreviated PRWORA, also commonly described as the 1996 Welfare Reform Act), Public Law 104-193, was passed by the 104th United States Congress and signed into law by then President Bill Clinton. The law was the cornerstone of the Republican Party's Contract with America and fulfilled Clinton's promise to "end welfare as we have come to know it." While its most famous component was the replacement of Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) by the more temporary and less generous Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, the law had lesser known provisions surrounding non-citizen eligibility for welfare benefits.

The law defined "federal public benefits" and "state and local public benefits." PRWORA required the Attorney General to establish regulations and interim guidance for the verification of immigration status of persons applying for federal public benefits, including benefits whose existing statutes did not specifically state that verification of immigration status was required. The guidance is for any entity administering a non-exempt federal public benefit, other than non-profit charitable organizations, and is not limited to the agencies and programs specified in IRCA or those using SAVE. However, SAVE helps with compliance with this guidance.

PRWORA made a distinction between two kinds of non-citizens, broadly defined:

Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996

The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 required the Immigration and Naturalization Services (that would later be restructured as the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and its sub-agency, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services) to cooperate with federal, state, and local agencies to determine the citizenship or immigration status of any individual within the jurisdiction of the agency for any purposes authorized by law. The SAVE program (that was already in existence) is the way that DHS and USCIS meet the obligation. IIRIRA also contained provisions that led to the creation of the Basic Pilot Program, that would eventually morph into E-Verify, the analogue of SAVE used by employers.

REAL ID Act of 2005

The REAL ID Act of 2005 mandated that state-issued IDs (such as driver's license or state ID cards) could be used as proof of identity by the federal level only if they complied with specific compliance measures. Of the various federal identification purposes to which these compliance measures were relevant, the one with the largest affected population was commercial air travel in the United States. However, since most US states have not fully implemented the standards, the date from which only compliant IDs will be accepted has been pushed back to January 22, 2018.

One of the compliance requirements for state driver's licenses and identification cards is the requirement to verify the legal presence status of non-citizens seeking these documents using SAVE. State Department of Motor Vehicles can either directly enroll in SAVE, or use AAMVANet, the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators Network.

One of the issues created by the REAL ID Act was that people on temporary non-immigrant statuses could be in legal status despite having an expired visa, and state offices were not necessarily equipped to evaluate the legality of their current status. SAVE is intended to help with making less error-prone determinations of legal status for these cases. SAVE has had some known issues, including not having up-to-date information for extensions of stay, extensions of stay for dependents, and change of status from student to temporary worker. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement provides guidance to students who encounter problems getting a driver's license or state identification card due to these issues.

Expansion of SAVE to any purpose authorized by law

A System of Records Notice by DHS, published on December 11, 2008, expanded the use of SAVE to any purpose authorized by law.

Mandating of E-Verify and change to the format of Privacy Impact Assessment

E-Verify, the analogue of SAVE for private employers, was mandated by the IIRIRA of 1996, and initially launched as the Basic Pilot Program before becoming a fully fledged program mandated for some employers around 2008.

Until 2008, DHS conducted Privacy Impact Assessments (PIAs) for the individual systems used in SAVE and E-Verify, specifically the VIS and PCQS. However, in 2010, DHS switched to conducting PIAs for the programs as seen by their end users, i.e., PIAs for SAVE and E-Verify.

Continued increase in mandated use of SAVE

Over time, the use of SAVE has been getting increasingly mandated for various federal and state programs. For a long time, the use of SAVE was optional for agencies administering the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. However, the Agricultural Act of 2014 made it mandatory.

1995 review by the Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services

In 1995, the Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) conducted a review of SAVE at the request of the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), a division of HHS. The review focused only on aliens applying for Aid to Families with Dependent Children and Medicaid, the programs requiring the use of SAVE that HHS was responsible for. The review looked at verification requests between October 1992 and December 1993. It found that:

The report put most of the responsibility and blame on state agencies, and recommended to the ACF and the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) to remind state agencies of SAVE requirements. ACF, however, believed that the problems were more the result of poor design of the system by INS.

2003 Government Accountability Office report on issuing Social Security numbers

As of 2003, the Social Security Administration used independent third-party verification of documentation submitted by noncitizens with the issuing agencies (U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Department of State) prior to issuing a Social Security Number. The verification of these documents involved using SAVE. A 2003 Government Accountability Office report highlighted potential weaknesses in the way SSA was using SAVE. In particular, it noted that whereas SAVE was able to verify the immigration status for the applicant based on the information provided by the applicant, SSA staff were neglecting to actually verify the authenticity of the documents themselves, making it possible to issue a SSN based on fake documentation corresponding to a real but different person. Other weaknesses in SSA's use of SAVE were also identified.

DHS and USCIS efforts to address criticism and concerns

DHS and USCIS have made efforts to be more transparent about the use of SAVE and improve monitoring of it.

DHS has a Compliance Tracking and Monitoring System (CTMS) for SAVE, to make sure that agencies using SAVE do not misuse it. CTMS is exempt from some provisions of the Privacy Act.

Criticisms by private institutions

The Electronic Privacy Information Center has been critical of SAVE and of the expansion of the Basic Pilot Program (now E-Verify) that uses the same backend systems as SAVE.

The Immigration Policy Center has been critical of SAVE for the following reasons:

The IPC has also been critical of the use of SAVE for determining voting eligibility.