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The director of USCIS calls for the naturalization test “too easy”, wants to redesign

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EXCLUSIVE: The director of new citizenship and immigration services (USCIS), Joseph Edlow, does not waste time paving the way for American citizenship.

A few weeks in work, he calls for a major overhaul of the American naturalization test – exploding the current version as too soft and out of step with what the Congress was considering.

In an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital, Edlow said that civic and English examination, which constitutes the backbone of the naturalization process, does not reflect the knowledge and assimilation which, according to him, should become American.

“The test must reflect the letter and the spirit of what the Congress wanted,” said Edlow. “It is important that people understand English, our history, our government … and the way the test is written and executed at the moment does not meet this bar.”

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The Deputy Director of American Citizenship and Immigration Services for Politics Joseph Edlow and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, applaud and congratulate new Americans at a naturalization ceremony in the Washington State Department, American on October 22, 2020

The director of citizenship services and immigration services, Joseph Edlow, does not waste time paving the way for American citizenship. (Manuel Balce Ceneta, swimming pool via Reuters)

In the current format, candidates for naturalization must correctly answer six out of 10 civic questions selected at random from a list of 100, covering subjects such as the Constitution, the history of the United States, geography and civic responsibilities. They must also read a sentence aloud and write a simple sentence properly in English.

Edlow says it is not enough. He wants the probe test more deeply – with a broader transverse cut of American principles – and for English skills to be evaluated throughout the naturalization interview, not only in isolated reading and writing exercises.

“I want the referees to listen to and speak really throughout the interview,” he said. “Exchange part of the label … and see if individuals are still able to understand the questions. It is a better preparation gauge.”

Edlow said the test must preserve the integrity of the process and reflect assimilation expectations. He also underlined a recent decree declaring English the national language, calling for mastery of the language “an imperative” part of the American dream.

The director has also targeted long-standing defects in the H-1B visa system, which allows American companies to hire highly skilled foreign workers in specialized areas.

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“Companies opt for the most qualified workers, but pay them at the lowest level,” he said. “This undervaluits American graduates, especially in the STEM fields.”

He cited cases when third -party contracts have helped employers dismiss American workers – sometimes even forcing them to train their own foreign replacements – as proof of a program exploited to remove wages.

vice-president Jd vance echoes a similar feeling. In July, he called Microsoft for dismissed around 9,000 American workers while asking for 4,700 H1-B visas. “I do not want companies to fire 9,000 American workers and then say:” We cannot find workers here in America. “It’s a story of Bulls —.”

The Visa program has become a political flash point within the GOP, creating a gap between populists Maga and the conservatives pro-enterprise.

Vice-president JD Vance visits the metallus factory in Canton, Ohio, Monday July 28, 2025. (

Vice-president JD Vance called Microsoft for dismissed around 9,000 American workers while asking for 4,700 H1-B visas. (Maddie McGarvey / The New York Times via AP, POO)

Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, said that he “would go to war” to support the Visa H1-B program and marked his republican opponents “of hateful and unrepentant racists”.

To tighten the program monitoring, Edlow said that the USCIS will work with the Ministry of Labor to extend the work work application and ensure that the wages and the functions of the jobs correspond to what is on paper.

“We want to make sure that the people brought are really proportional to the roles they fulfill-and not being part of a cost reduction program,” he added.

On the issue of well -being immigration policy, Edlow said that USCIS is preparing to revisit the rule of public charges – a legal standard that prohibits green cards for candidates likely to depend on public aid.

Image of a citizenship test

The director of citizenship and immigration services, Joseph Edlow, requests a major overhaul of the American naturalization test. (Getty Images)

The rule has existed in a form or another for more than a century, but has been more strictly interpreted during the Trump administration to include certain non -monetary advantages such as Medicaid or housing aid. The Biden administration returned advice that did not take into account non -monetary advantages.

Edlow said the changes would take time.

“This is something that we have to study and do well,” he said. “We must examine the advantages subject to the means offered and ensure that our referees know what to look for to determine if someone would be a burden for us taxpayers.”

Beyond the policy changes, Edlow reported the growing backlog of the USCIS case as a superior operational threat – that which, according to him, now has implications for national security.

“The arrears that continue to grow are nothing less than a national security threat to this country,” he said, blaming the Biden administration to keep the resources of legal immigration agencies away in response to record illegal border crossings.

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While he is committed to reducing arbitration times, Edlow warned that shortcuts will not be part of the strategy.

“There may be short-term pain,” he said. “But we will decrease the backward to a constant clip while protecting the integrity and safety of the system.”

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