Happy Veterans Day

We want to take a moment to express our gratitude to all the veterans and active military personnel that have chosen to serve on our behalf in the U. S. Armed Services. We would also like to remember all the courageous men and women who have made the ultimate sacrifice while defending our country, freedom,…

The U.S. Court of Appeals of the 7th circuit issued a stay on November 3, 2020 authorizing the USCIS public charge rules to be reinstated while the matter is on appeal.

On November 3, 2020, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the government should be able to continue applying the new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) public charge rule, just one day after a federal district court had vacated the rule. This means U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) may continue to apply the…

Beginning 11/2/20, asylum offices will no longer accept the filing of Form I-589s that previously were filed directly with a local asylum office. These forms must be filed with the Asylum Vetting Center in Atlanta, Georgia. The address is as follows: USCIS Asylum Vetting Center P.O. Box 57100 Atlanta, GA 30308-0506 The National Vetting Center…

On November 2, 2020, the U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Illinois ruled that DHS’s Public Charge Rule, 84 Fed. Reg. 41,292 (Aug. 14, 2019) violates the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”). The district court specifically ruled that (1) the public charge exceeds DHS’s authority under the public charge provision of the INA, (2)…

ACLU attorneys say that the parents of 545 children can not be found after they were separated from their children by the Trump Administration. Trump claimed last night that the children were “ well taken care of”. The children were kept in a former 250,000 square foot Walmart where they were held in “cages”. According…

On September 29, 2020, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White of the Northern District of California granted a preliminary injunction of the “USCIS Fee Schedule & Changes to Certain Other Immigration Benefit Requests Requirements” Final Rule which would have increased USCIS fees by a weighted average increase of 20 percent on October 02, 2020. The…

USCIS announced that following the September 11, 2020, Second Circuit decision, it will apply the public charge final rule and related guidance in the USCIS Policy Manual to all applications and petitions postmarked (or submitted electronically) on or after February 24, 2020. Per USCIS: “If you filed your Form I-485, Application to Register Permanent Residence…

USCIS published a temporary final rule providing that, from today, September 23, 2020, through March 22, 2021, asylum applicants who cannot proceed with the asylum interview in English must ordinarily use DHS-provided telephonic interpreters, due to COVID-19. Previously, if the asylum seeker didn’t bring an interpreter and couldn’t speak English, the affirmative asylum hearing was…

The current active court case backlog as of the end of August 2020 has grown to 1,246,164—up 11 percent from the beginning of March when the backlog was 1,122,824. Monthly case completions before the March shutdown were running over 40,000. In August just 6,113 cases were completed. Roughly half (52%) of these were ordered deported…