US Immigration laws granting benefits to religious workers are liberal, allowing visas for religious workers that are quite easily obtained on both, a temporary and a permanent basis. The religious worker program was designed to allow churches, synagogues and similar religious organizations to hire qualified foreigners to fill positions as religious workers. The program allows thousands of foreigners into the US each year. Many religious workers first come to the US on a temporary basis (R-1 Visa), but are later able to become special religious worker immigrants (green card holders) after they have served in the same religious position for at least two years. Moreover, the process for becoming a permanent resident (green card holder) as a religious worker is much shorter than most other applications for permanent residence.

Due to the relative ease in obtaining temporary religious worker visas and thereafter, the quick transition to lawful permanent residence, the religious worker program has had a high rate of fraud. Following a 2005 assessment of the program, the USCIS announced that it has uncovered rampant fraud in the program, with nearly 1/3 of such applications being fraudulent. The review uncovered petitions filed by non-existent religious organizations, petitioning organizations that were unaware of the petition, multi-filings by organizations that cannot afford to pay for the number of petitions filed, and the like. Arrests in connection with religious worker visa fraud have uncovered unqualified beneficiaries of the program employed as gas station attendants, truck drivers, or factory workers, among other things.

In response to the high rate of fraud, the USCIS has published proposed changes to the religious worker visa classifications that are intended to ensure the integrity of the religious worker program. Included in the proposed rules is a policy of not approving religious worker petitions without a site visit by investigating officers to the petitioning organization. The USCIS has already begun conducting such inspections, meant to ensure the legitimacy of the petitioner and the employment offer, despite the fact that the proposed changes have not yet been finalized.

Currently, every religious organization that files a visa petition for a religious worker is visited before the petition can be approved, without regard to the details of the case. However, where an organization has been visited concerning a religious worker petition and approved, further visits will not be made for additional workers petitioned by the same organization in the next five years, absent indications of fraud. At present, the proposed rule does not contain a requirement that the petitioner or the attorney be notified in advance of the visit.

The mandatory on-site inspections are sure to cause long delays in the adjudication of religious worker applications, resulting in worker shortages in synagogues, hospitals, schools, and affecting thousands of people.