USCIS Waiver NEWS AND UPDATES

February 22, 2012

I-601 Provisional Waiver Is Not Yet in Effect

USCIS is considering changes that would allow certain immediate relatives (the spouse, children or parents of a U.S. citizen) who can demonstrate extreme hardship to a U.S. citizen spouse or parent to receive a provisional waiver of the unlawful presence bars before leaving the United States.

These procedures are not in effect and will not be available to potential applicants until USCIS publishes a final rule in the Federal Register specifying the effective date. USCIS plans to publish a notice of proposed rulemaking in the coming months and will consider all comments received as part of that process before publishing a final rule.

Do not send an application requesting a provisional waiver at this time. USCIS will reject any application requesting this new process and we will return the application package and any related fees to the applicant. USCIS cannot accept applications until a final rule is issued and the process change becomes effective.

Be aware that some unauthorized practitioners of immigration law may wrongly claim they can currently file a provisional waiver application (Form I-601) for you. These same individuals may ask you to pay them to file such forms although the process is not yet in place. Please avoid such scams. USCIS wants you to learn the facts about protecting yourself and your family against scammers by visiting uscis.gov/avoidscams.

If you already have an immigrant visa interview with the U.S. Department of State, we strongly encourage you to attend or to notify the Consulate that you wish to reschedule it. The Department of State may cancel your immigrant visa registration if you fail to appear at this interview or to contact them.

January 6, 2012

BREAKING NEWS: CONCURRENT FILING OF I-130 and I-601 TO BE IMPLEMENTED WITHIN A YEAR: WAIVER ADJUDICATION WILL OCCUR BEFORE YOU HAVE TO DEPART THE UNITED STATES!

Citizenship and Immigration Services proposes to allow the immigrants to obtain a provisional waiver in the United States, before they leave for their countries to pick up their visas. Having the waiver in hand will allow them to depart knowing that they will almost certainly be able to return, officials said. The agency is also seeking to sharply streamline the process to cut down the wait times for visas to a few weeks at most.

On Friday, the agencypublished a formal notice in the Federal Register that it is preparing a new regulation governing the waivers: Provisional Waivers of Inadmissibility For Certain Immediate Relatives of U.S. Citizens
But agency officials, speaking on condition of anonymity on Thursday before the proposal was formally announced, stressed that this was only the beginning of a long regulatory process that they hoped to complete by issuing a new rule before the end of this year.

December 26, 2011

USCIS Ombudsman Update

DHS Roundtable Discussion: I-601 Waivers of Inadmissibility: Does the Current Process Work? When is Hardship Extreme? Do Alternative Models Exist?

USCIS Refugee Asylum and International Operations (RAIO) has been working towards a goal of completing adjudications of I-601 applications within six months from the receipt date. In FY 2011, there was an 82 percent reduction in the number of cases that remained pending over six months.

The Ciudad Juarez Field Office (CDJ) receives approximately 75 percent of the annual world-wide case load. CDJ operates with three adjudicators and a field office director, Ms. Yolanda Miranda. (Not nearly enough).

November 2011

USCIS Ombudsman Update

USCIS is considering plans for centralized filing through a Lockbox facility in the United States with adjudication to be performed at the Nebraska Service Center (NSC). To date, USCIS has not finalized these plans or provided an implementation timeline. USCIS' goal appears to be processing all I-601 waivers at a single service center, rather than distributing applications to various international and domestic offices for adjudication. USCIS has also indicated that it hopes that centralizing processing will: 1) Eliminate the existing three-month appointment delay; and, 2) enable I-601s that are not readily approvable to be reviewed and processed more quickly than those that are referred by Ciudad Juarez and sent to other USCIS facilities for adjudication, which may currently take up to eleven months.

October 18, 2011

IMMIGRANT VISA REFUSAL RATES REPORT

In a report released by USCIS with statistics for Fiscal Year 2010 it is apparent that the ground of inadmissibility being waived matters a lot. In FY 2010 over 85% of those charged with the unlawful presence bar overcame it. Compare this to a crime involving moral turpitude or fraud where only 34% and 25% percent overcame it, respectively. Although the standard for these waivers is the same, the huge difference in approval percentages makes clear that those grounds are not treated the same.  Note: report appears at the last page of linked document.

September 20, 2011

USCIS ANNOUNCES FORM I-601 FILING PROCESS CHANGES WHICH WILL AFFECT PROCESSING TIMES

Currently, applicants who reside overseas must file a Form I-601 at a U.S. Embassy or consulate after a consular officer finds the individual inadmissible for a ground that may be waived. USCIS will be implementing a plan to have all Form I-601s filed and adjudicated domestically in the U.S. This procedural change will also affect the filing and adjudication of Forms I-212 and I-290B associated with the Form I-601 filings.

As part of this process change, all overseas applicants will file their Forms I-601 through the mail at a USCIS Lockbox that will then forward to the Nebraska Service Center (NSC) for adjudication. During the first 6 months of this change, applicants who reside in Mexico would be given the option of filing their I-601 applications with the USCIS Field Office in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, (CDJ) or filing their applications with the Lockbox for adjudication by the NSC. USCIS will monitor and assess the implementation of the changed procedures throughout this 6-month timeframe.

What this probably means is an end to the fast-track processing currently available only in Ciudad Juarez for Mexican I-601 waivers for "clearly approvable" cases to be adjudicated within a month or less.  Now all the cases from Mexico will take at least 6 months and maybe more time to receive a decision.  The good news is that more officers will probably be assigned to waivers and perhaps current non-Mexico and Mexico-referred waivers processing times will be reduced.