The director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services told Congress that refugees can be admitted into the country without documents or physical evidence, but it's not typical.
According to The Washington Times, director Leon Rodriguez said 7 percent of applications from Syrians have been rejected. They have "turned a lot of people down" and a "significant" number of refugees have been implicated in terrorist plots in the past eight years, but his officers can pick up on warning signs when processing the refugees.
Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz told Rodriguez, "We keep seeing instances over and over again of refugees coming to America with an intention to engage in terrorism," and noted that the department knew how many people it denied but not how many refugees had connections to terrorism.
"We review every new case and ask ourselves, 'Is there something we should have done differently?'" Rodriguez replied. A testimony could get a refugee admitted without documentation, he added, and a "testimony can be the basis for the grant of a refugee. But it needs to be tested against other information that we know. The country conditions, at a minimum."
The Obama administration said it wants to admit a target of 110,000 refugees in fiscal year 2017, which begins Oct. 1.
Cruz posted a clip of his exchange with Rodriguez on his YouTube channel.
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