8 May 8-14, 2025 miaminewtimes.com | browardpalmbeach.com NEW TIMES | MUSIC | CAFE | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | NEWS | LETTERS | CONTENTS | Powers says, adding that a trek to the United States can be costly, and many refugees arrive with little or no money. “They’re just trying to put a roof over their heads, feed their kids, and find some way to be sustainable, and then they find out they have to go to court to get asylum,” she notes. “That’s the part when they come to me before their first hearing. They typically don’t understand the gravity of the situation, and they’re traumatized.” The interview process, conducted by United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (US- CIS), can bewilder migrants, partially because the federal government has an 11-year backlog of mi- grant interviews to conduct, Powers says. Powers says USCIS is currently conducting in- terviews for migrants who filed for asylum as early as 2014. In December 2018, the final month of Donald Trump’s first presidency, the federal government began expediting interviews for asylum seekers who filed on or after December 10, 2018, Powers said. That, coupled with expedited interviews for those fleeing Afghanistan after the U.S. military withdrew its presence in February 2020 and ex- pedited interviews for those at the southern bor- der, postponed interviews for those who filed for asylum before December 2018, she said. Nationalities with the Highest Chances of Gaining Asylum in Miami 1. Russia: 74 percent acceptance rate (241 approvals out of 325) 2. Ukraine: 69 percent acceptance rate (39 approvals out of 57) 3. Egypt: 63 percent acceptance rate (19 approvals out of 30) 4. Vietnam: 56 percent acceptance rate (19 approvals out of 34) According to Mobile Pathways data, Miami’s data for the nationalities mentioned in both lists above appear similar to nationwide probabilities. New Times focused on nationalities with at least 1,000 asylum applicants throughout the U.S. over the past ten years. Nationalities with the Highest Chances of Gaining Asylum in the U.S. 1. Belarus: 90 percent acceptance rate (917 approvals out of 1,013) 2. Soviet Union: 89 percent acceptance rate (1,263 out of 1,406) 3. (tie) Russia: 83 percent acceptance rate (8,390 out of 10,000) (tie) Syria: 83 percent acceptance rate (1,091 out of 1,288) 5. Afghanistan: 82 percent acceptance rate (1,155 out of 1,398) Nationalities with the Lowest Chances of Gaining Asylum in the U.S. 1. Dominican Republic: 89 percent denial rate (1,112 rejections out of 1,250) 2. Haiti: 86 percent denial rate (5,081 rejections out of 5,880) 3. Mexico: 85 percent denial rate (39,000 rejections out of 45,000) 4. Brazil: 80 percent denial rate (8,577 rejections out of 11,000) 5. Jamaica: 80 percent denial rate (985 rejec- tions out of 1,235) [email protected] Odds Against from p6 ALWAYS IN YOUR FEED. CHOOSE YOUR CHANNEL
