The MAVNI program status is closed. The Department of Defense let the Military Accessions Vital to the National Interest pilot’s authorization expire on September 30, 2017, and has not renewed it since. No new applications are being accepted, and no comparable program currently allows non-citizens without a green card to enlist.
How the Program Ended
MAVNI was authorized in November 2008 by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates as a recruiting tool aimed at two hard-to-fill categories: military healthcare specialties and fluency in strategically important foreign languages. It gave certain legally present non-citizens, including asylees, refugees, TPS holders, some non-immigrant visa holders, and (after September 2014) DACA recipients, a route into the armed forces along with an accelerated path to U.S. citizenship.
The unraveling started in 2016. The Obama administration suspended new enlistments over concerns that recruits’ foreign ties were not being screened thoroughly enough. Enhanced screening protocols were supposed to follow, and enrollment was supposed to resume. It didn’t. The Trump administration suspended the program indefinitely in 2017, and the authorization lapsed that September.
The enhanced security requirements created a bottleneck the system could not clear. MAVNI recruits had to pass a Single Scope Background Investigation, the same investigation used for top-secret clearances, and those checks ran far longer than standard enlistment vetting. Thousands who had already signed enlistment contracts waited months or years. Some left jobs and turned down other opportunities. Some watched their immigration status expire while they waited.
What Happened to Recruits Left in Limbo
Two class-action cases resolved the worst of the fallout for people caught mid-process.
Kirwa v. Department of Defense, filed in 2017, challenged the military’s refusal to sign Form N-426, the certification of honorable service that USCIS requires before processing a naturalization application. Without that form, recruits sitting in the Delayed Entry Program couldn’t move forward. In September 2020, the court entered a permanent injunction ordering the Department of Defense to stop refusing to certify these service members’ honorable service.
The Calixto settlement addressed Army MAVNI enlistees who received uncharacterized discharges, the discharge type usually given when a recruit separates before completing initial training. That kind of discharge normally wouldn’t count as “honorable” for naturalization. Under the settlement, the Army agreed to treat certain MAVNI recruits discharged by September 22, 2022 as having served honorably and to certify Form N-426 on their behalf, even if they never attended initial entry training.
These cases fixed specific problems for stranded recruits. Neither reopened the program.
Options for Non-Citizens Who Want to Serve
Without MAVNI, enlistment through standard recruiting channels requires lawful permanent resident status. Green card holders can enlist in all branches, draw the same pay and benefits, and pursue the same naturalization pathways as any other service member. Certain positions requiring security clearances remain restricted to citizens, which narrows the career fields open to green card holders until they naturalize.
For people who are legally present but not permanent residents, no program comparable to MAVNI is currently accepting applications. Some members of Congress have called for reinstating or modernizing it, but nothing has been enacted, and the Department of Defense has not announced plans to resume recruiting non-permanent residents.
Military Naturalization Pathways That Still Exist
For those who do qualify to enlist, military service remains among the fastest routes to U.S. citizenship. Two provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act do the work.
- Section 328 (peacetime service): at least one year of honorable service, lawful permanent resident status at the time of the naturalization interview, and the standard residency and physical presence requirements.
- Section 329 (service during hostilities): honorable service during a designated period of hostilities. The current period began September 11, 2001 and remains in effect. Service members who qualify are exempt from residency and physical presence requirements and do not need to be lawful permanent residents, as long as they were physically present in the United States at the time of enlistment.
Section 329 was what made MAVNI’s citizenship fast track possible in the first place. Some participants naturalized during or shortly after Basic Combat Training. The legal machinery for that speed still exists. The obstacle now is the enlistment door: without a green card and without MAVNI, most non-citizens can’t get through it.
Related Protections Still Available
USCIS maintains a few protections for people already connected to the military, though none of them reopen enlistment.
Deferred action may still be available for MAVNI enlistees who were in the Delayed Entry Program, and their immediate family members may qualify as well. The Immigrant Military Members and Veterans Initiative allows certain current and former service members outside the United States to request parole to reenter the country. Parole in place may be granted case by case to undocumented family members of active-duty service members, reservists, and veterans who were not dishonorably discharged.
These are narrow tools for specific situations. They don’t create a new enlistment pathway.
The Realistic Path Forward
If you have medical credentials or critical language skills and were hoping MAVNI would reopen, the practical route in 2026 is to pursue lawful permanent residency through the existing immigration system first, then enlist through standard military recruiting once you have a green card. From there, Section 328 or Section 329 handles the citizenship side.
If you’re a former MAVNI recruit whose case was affected by the shutdown, the Kirwa injunction and the Calixto settlement may still be relevant to how your service is certified for naturalization purposes, and consulting an immigration attorney familiar with military naturalization is worth the time.