## Facts

- Noncitizens’ immigration records are maintained in Alien Registration Files (“A-Files”) held by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its components, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
- Noncitizens and their attorneys commonly request copies of A-Files through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. § 552, to prepare for removal proceedings, pursue immigration benefits, or seek citizenship.
- FOIA generally requires an agency to make a determination on a request within 20 business days, with a limited extension of up to 10 additional business days in “unusual circumstances.”
- For at least eight years, USCIS and ICE failed to meet FOIA’s statutory deadlines for A-File requests; processing times commonly exceeded statutory limits (including averages on the order of months during the relevant period).
- Plaintiffs (immigration attorneys and noncitizens) brought a nationwide class action alleging systemic, unlawful delays in A-File FOIA processing and seeking declaratory and injunctive relief.
- The court certified two nationwide Rule 23(b)(2) classes covering A-File FOIA requesters and attorneys who submit such requests for clients.
- Plaintiffs moved for summary judgment seeking classwide relief; defendants argued high request volume, resource constraints, and asserted good-faith efforts made broad injunctive relief inappropriate.

## Issues

1. Whether DHS, USCIS, and ICE violated FOIA by failing to make timely determinations on A-File FOIA requests within FOIA’s statutory deadlines.
2. Whether FOIA permits, and the record supported, nationwide classwide declaratory and injunctive relief to remedy systemic FOIA-delay violations.
3. Whether claimed workload pressures, resource constraints, and incremental improvements defeated standing, mootness, or the need for structural relief.

## Decision

- The court granted summary judgment for plaintiffs.
- The court declared that defendants’ systemic practices causing chronic delays in A-File FOIA processing violated FOIA’s timing requirements.
- The court rejected the view that an acknowledgment of receipt or placement in a queue satisfies FOIA’s “determination” requirement.
- The court held that high volume and resource constraints did not excuse long-term noncompliance with FOIA’s deadlines.
- The court found the case not moot and concluded plaintiffs and class members faced a real and immediate risk of ongoing unlawful delay.
- The court issued nationwide injunctive relief requiring timely processing of A-File FOIA requests and imposing backlog-reduction and compliance-monitoring obligations.

## Legal Principles

- FOIA’s deadline to make a “determination” requires a substantive response (at minimum addressing compliance and appeal rights), not mere acknowledgment or indefinite queuing.
- Chronic, systemic failure to meet FOIA’s statutory deadlines constitutes an ongoing FOIA violation.
- Workload, high request volume, and agency resource constraints do not authorize agencies to extend FOIA deadlines beyond the statute’s limited extension provisions.
- When unlawful FOIA delays result from uniform, agency-wide practices, classwide declaratory and injunctive relief may be ordered to secure future compliance.
- Incremental improvements do not moot claims for prospective relief where the record shows a continuing pattern of noncompliance and persistent backlogs.

## Conclusion

The court concluded that DHS and its components’ longstanding, systemic delays in processing A-File FOIA requests violated FOIA’s statutory timing requirements and warranted nationwide declaratory judgment and structural injunctive relief to ensure timely determinations and reduce unlawful backlogs.


Nightingale v. U.S. Citizenship & Immigr. Servs., 507 F. Supp. 3d 1193 (N.D. Cal. 2020)