Becoming an American may have just become more difficult.<\/p>\n
U.S. green card holders applying to be naturalized citizens will now, as of Monday, face a changed civics test that critics say is both more complex and more subjective.<\/p>\n
In a September statement announcing the implementation of the new test<\/a>, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) spokesperson Matthew Tragesser said that \u201cby ensuring only those aliens who meet all eligibility requirements, including the ability to read, write, and speak English and understand U.S. government and civics, are able to naturalize, the American people can be assured that those joining us as fellow citizens are fully assimilated and will contribute to America\u2019s greatness.\u201d<\/p>\n USCIS director Joseph Edlow, who took office in July, claimed<\/a> last month that the previous test was \u201cjust too easy\u201d to pass. \u201cWe need to make it a little bit more challenging,\u201d Edlow said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got to make sure that people are actually understanding what it means to be a U.S. citizen, what it means to get that benefit.\u201d<\/p>\n Stephen Mihm, a professor of history at the University of Georgia, however, wrote in Bloomberg<\/a> last month that the updated test would remain \u201cuseless\u201d as a barometer of \u201cAmericanness,\u201d pointing to a 2018 survey that showed just one in three Americans would pass the previous version of the exam if they took it<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rights organizations have also urged USCIS<\/a> to halt the rollout of the exam, claiming that it will disproportionately burden individuals with \u201clow literacy, limited financial resources, lack of access to preparation materials, and older applicants who may find the increased complexity difficult to navigate.\u201d In an Oct. 10 letter to Edlow, a group of organizations wrote that the civics test changes \u201ccreate inequities in the testing process, making it harder for certain populations to succeed, which undermines the principle of fairness in the naturalization process.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n A brief history of the citizenship exam<\/p>\n The exam is perhaps one of the most well-known parts of the U.S. citizenship application process, but it has undergone many changes since its origins in the courtroom, where decades ago individual judges could quiz applicants\u2019 knowledge of civics or national history\u2014though the process wasn\u2019t standardized\u2014to see if they met the 1802 Naturalization Act<\/a>\u2019s requirement that applicants be \u201cattached to the principles of the constitution of the United States.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n But amid growing frustrations over the influx of migrants in the early 1900s, U.S. officials debated imposing new immigration restrictions to ensure \u201cquantity and quality as not to make too difficult the process of assimilation,\u201d according to Smithsonian Magazine.<\/a> A congressional commission was created in 1907 that ultimately recommended requiring a literacy test, calling it the most \u201cfeasible method\u201d to assess the quality of migrants entering the country. But after vetoes by successive Presidents, a literacy test wasn\u2019t implemented until 1917, when Congress overrode Woodrow Wilson\u2019s veto.<\/p>\n In the meantime, Congress had established the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization in 1906<\/a> to \u201chave charge of all matters concerning the naturalization of aliens.\u201d Under that law, citizenship applicants had to be able to speak English but the courts still oversaw the determination of applicants\u2019 civic knowledge. According to USCIS<\/a>, in the bureau\u2019s nascent years, it received concerns from some judges, applicants for citizenship, and other groups about people being unfairly denied citizenship because they lacked specific knowledge\u2014leading the bureau to develop a program to help immigrants learn about civics and history.<\/p>\n In the 1910s and the 1920s, naturalization examiners, instead of judges, began asking applicants questions about civics and U.S. history. The bureau also published its first Federal Textbook on Citizenship in 1918 to allow applicants to prepare.\u00a0<\/p>\n But without a standardized test, some of the reported questions seemed arbitrary (i.e. \u201cHow high is the Bunker Hill monument?\u201d). That changed in the 1930s, when the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) under Commissioner D.W. MacCormack ordered \u201ca definite and uniform procedure\u201d to evaluate applicants for citizenship. According to the Federal Register\u2019s notice on the 2025 test<\/a>, MacCormack emphasized then that the tests were meant to \u201cdemonstrate the attachment to the principles of the Constitution rather than memorization of facts, and that the examination be uniform, fair, and devoid of \u2018trick questions.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Basic knowledge of U.S. history and civics became<\/a> an explicit requirement for naturalization under the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. The test stayed oral, however, and the degree of questioning was \u201cdetermined by the alien\u2019s education, background, and interactions with the examiner,\u201d according to the Federal Register.<\/p>\n Linguistics expert Antony John Kunnan wrote in a 2009 academic article<\/a> that standardization \u201cwas only raised when aliens seeking citizenship through the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 were required to meet educational requirements.\u201d Applicants who qualified under the Act, according to the Federal Register, could opt to show their understanding of U.S. history and government by taking a prescribed course. For others, the INS developed what became known as the \u201c100 civics questions,\u201d based on content from Federal Textbooks on Citizenship.<\/p>\n Still, the INS began the process of revising in 1997, after a study by accounting firm Coopers and Lybrand found that the agency<\/a> \u201chad no standard naturalization test content, testing instruments, test protocols, or scoring system.\u201d<\/p>\n The U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform also released a report in 1997<\/a> that showed INS offices widely differed in the ways they administered the civics and literacy tests and in the threshold number of correct answers required for passing. It also added that the assessment methods weren\u2019t meaningful: \u201cthe civics test, for example, relies on memorization of discrete facts rather than on substantive understanding of the basic concepts of civic participation\u201d and that \u201cU.S. history and civics test should assess whether applicants understand the basic principles of U.S. government: for example, what it means to have freedom of speech or the freedom to assemble.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n In 2000, the civics test\u2019s questions were standardized, but eight years later a new, more difficult test was implemented<\/a>, requiring 6 correct answers from 10 questions chosen from a pool of 100 questions, as well as an English test that required applicants to demonstrate their ability to read, speak, and write a sentence in English. The New York Times reported in 2007 that some immigrants could pass the previous version of the civics test \u201cwithout any study,\u201d and immigration officials told the paper that the 2008 exam aimed to compel even highly educated applicants to study. Historians lauded the new set of questions, the Times reported, saying that they covered ideas about the workings of American democracy and the diversity of the groups which influenced U.S. history.<\/p>\n Since then, the 2008 version of the test has largely been used. But in December 2020, Trump\u2019s first-term Administration rolled out an update, which replaced questions about geography with more complex questions about history and historical personalities\u2019 biographical details, which could possibly trip up applicants. The pool of possible questions was raised to 128, and the requirement for correct answers raised to 12 out of 20 asked.\u00a0<\/p>\n Critics also panned the Trump Administration\u2019s 2020 test for having an alleged conservative bias<\/a>. But that version of the test was short-lived, as President Joe Biden\u2019s Administration, reverted it to the 2008 version in early 2021, based on a preliminary \u201cdetermination that the 2020 civics test development process, content, testing procedures, and implementation schedule may inadvertently create potential barriers to the naturalization process.\u201d<\/p>\n The latest changes\u2014and what might come next<\/p>\n The 2025 civics test is similar to the 2020 one, except officers will only be required to ask questions until the applicant either passes or fails the test. For example, if an applicant answers nine questions incorrectly, they have failed the exam, and the officer will not ask the remaining questions.<\/p>\n The overall shift from 2008 to 2025 also reflects Trump\u2019s first-term Administration\u2019s move away from simple, one-word or short-answer questions, basic geography questions, and questions with minimal civic content to more specific and more complex ones that require better understanding of history.\u00a0<\/p>\n The question bank has been made public for applicants to review. Some differences between the 2025<\/a> test and the 2008 one<\/a> include questions on Dwight Eisenhower, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and more explanation-based questions like \u201cWhy did the United States enter the Persian Gulf War?\u201d or \u201cWhy did the United States enter the Vietnam War?\u201d (Answers: \u201cTo force the Iraqi military from Kuwait\u201d and \u201cTo stop the spread of communism,\u201d respectively.)<\/p>\n Applicants who already filed for naturalization before Oct. 20 will still take the 2008 version of the exam. And, according to the Federal Register, for applicants who \u201cqualify for special consideration because they are age 65 or older and have resided in the U.S. as a lawful permanent resident for at least 20 years,\u201d USCIS will administer a 10-question test formed from a \u201cspecially selected bank of 20 test questions\u201d from either the 2008 or 2025 tests.<\/p>\n The civics test, however, is just the beginning of potentially tougher screenings for those who wish to apply for American citizenship.<\/p>\n Edlow said last month that he\u2019s looking \u201cat other potential ways to move forward,\u201d such as having applicants write an essay. The essay format, Edlow told Axios<\/a>, could involve questions that \u201creally show an attachment to the Constitution.”<\/p>\n Critics, however, worry about potential biases. \u201cThey are opening the door for more biased decision-making based on arbitrary factors like race,” Eric Welsh, a partner at Reeves Immigration Law Group, told Axios. “It\u2019s extremely dangerous and a slippery slope.\u201d<\/p>\n There is also a proposal from Rep. Randy Fine (R, Fla.) to conduct the citizenship test entirely in English<\/a>. Currently there are legal provisions that allow some applicants to have the test administered in other languages.<\/p>\n But Edlow has also indicated that he wants to evaluate the English language proficiency of test takers, beyond the current simple reading and writing exercises.\u201cI want adjudicators to really be listening and talking throughout the interview,\u201d he told Fox News<\/a> in August. \u201cSwitch up some of the wording… and see if the individuals are still able to comprehend the questions. That\u2019s a better gauge of readiness.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Becoming an American may have just become more difficult. 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