The agency that funds itself, traced to the source.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services · DHS

USCIS is unlike almost every other agency: it pays for itself. The fees applicants and petitioners pay — chiefly into the Immigration Examinations Fee Account — fund the overwhelming majority of its work, while the appropriated dollars Congress provides are a small and shrinking sliver. This monitor keeps the two strictly apart, the way the budget itself does, across FY2025 actuals, the FY2026 continuing-resolution level, and the FY2027 request. Every number recomputes against its source.

Fee-funded (mandatory fees)

—

FY2027

Appropriated (net discretionary)

—

FY2027

Total budget authority

—

FY2027 — fee + appropriated, shown apart

Appropriated request vs. CR

—

FY2027 request vs. FY2026 CR level

Fee-funded vs appropriated — the two halves never conflated

$ in thousands · mandatory fee spending kept apart from appropriated dollars

The cyan bar is fee revenue — spending estimates funded by applicant and petitioner fees, not appropriated by Congress. The amber bar is the appropriated net-discretionary base. In the FY2027 request the appropriated side falls to —, returning USCIS toward a primarily fee-funded posture.