Congressman Jimmy Gomez (CA-34) led 49 of his colleagues in a letter to the Committee on Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee to request $100 million in federal funding for the Citizenship and Integration Grant Program (CIGP) for Fiscal Year (FY) 2024. This program, which is administered by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), has been critical to providing resources, support, and information to immigrants for their naturalization process.

Rep. Gomez has long advocated for increasing of funding for citizenship education and immigrant integration grants and has successfully increased funding for the program by 250% over the past two years.

"Increasing funding for the CIGP will both support immigrant-serving institutions, as well as increase the capacity for additional qualified legal service providers to assist with the naturalization application and process," wrote Congressman Jimmy Gomez (CA-34). "This will allow USCIS to more efficiently adjudicate applications by reducing filing errors, likely contributing to the agency-wide effort towards reducing casework backlogs and improving processing times."

"We are pleased to see Congress support immigrant integration through its investments and expansion of the USCIS Citizenship and Integration grant program," said Angelica Salas, CHIRLA Executive Director. "This grant has supported immigrant serving organizations enabling us to offer much needed integration services to legal permanent residents in the state of California. CHIRLA appreciates Congressman Gomez for his unwavering commitment to immigrant communities and his hard work in obtaining funding for citizenship grants. We urge Congress to continue their investing on immigrant success in FY 24."

"We thank Congressman Gomez for championing this important investment in assisting eligible permanent residents apply for U.S. citizenship," said Laura Vazquez, UnidosUS Associate Director of Immigrant Integration. "Recipients of these funds conduct important work that prepares eligible immigrants for naturalization and promotes civic integration through increased knowledge of English, U.S. history, and civics. About nine million permanent residents are eligible to become U.S. citizens, therefore the need for these grants is great and should continue to be increased."

"When we invest in naturalization, we're investing in the future of the United States. We're investing in an inclusive society where people have the opportunity to become citizens and we are collectively reducing barriers through English classes and increasing the legal services capacity of community-based organizations," said Nicole Melaku, National Partnership for New Americans Executive Director. "This is why the National Partnership for New Americans supports increasing funding for the Citizenship and Integration Grant Program, commends Congressman Gomez for leading this call, and commits to working as a network to ensure that Congress invests more deeply in citizenship and immigrant inclusion in fiscal year 2024."

Since 2017, the Office of Congressman Gomez has helped over 1,000 constituents with immigration cases, including applications for lawful permanent resident status (also known as a Green Card), employment authorization, and visas and has hosted citizenship workshops across California’s 34th Congressional District.

The CIGP has awarded more than $132 million through 579 competitive grants to immigrant-serving institutions in 39 states and the District of Columbia since the program began in 2009. Now in its fourteenth year, the program has helped more than 300,000 lawful permanent residents prepare for citizenship.

The letter can be found here.