Two bills are winding their way through the House’s Judiciary Committee that focus on immigration enforcement tactics and ignore any major policy changes: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Authorization Act (H.R. 2406) and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Act (H.R. 2407). Included in the former bill is a provision that gives ICE access to […]
Palmer Polaski Blog
The Supreme Court found unconstitutional the gender-based distinction in the immigration act, requiring a shorter period of parental physical presence in the U.S. for acquisition of citizenship through an unwed citizen mother versus an unwed citizen father. Rather than extending the shorter period of required physical presence to children of unwed citizen fathers, or the […]
Immigration courts have an enormous backlog that has not only persisted, but grown exponentially over the years. In 2006, the average case processing time was about 198 days. A decade later the same case will take 650 days to process. Government officials attribute the backlog to a number of factors: staffing shortages, lack of resources, […]
Under the Obama Administration, certain undocumented immigrants were permitted to have their immigration cases administratively closed in the exercise of prosecutorial discretion (PD), which in essence was a form of relief from deportation. Often this was granted when an undocumented parent of U.S. citizen children was placed in removal proceedings. The Trump Administration terminated the […]
Armed with a supplemental questionnaire, DS-5535, consular officers around the world have started more intensive vetting of some visa applicants — including requests for their social media handles (user name) — in an effort to block potential terrorists and other national security threats from entering the country. DS-5535 was rolled out as a temporary “emergency” […]
The Department of Labor has a minor but important role in some immigration matters, including the H-1 and H-2 visa programs and labor certification applications for employment-based green cards. After reviewing the DOL’s foreign worker visa programs, Labor Secretary R. Alexander Acosta announced actions to increase protections for American workers while aggressively confronting entitles that […]
In a scathing rebuke of the Administration’s executive order travel ban, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit upheld the nationwide preliminary injunction, enjoining the Administration from implementing it. Here’s what that court had to say: “The question for this Court, distilled to its essential form, is whether the Constitution … remains ‘a […]
The following additional items may be of interest to our readers: Sunset of Four Immigration Programs: Four immigration programs will collectively sunset (expire) on April 28, 2017 if the Continuing Resolution to fund the federal government is not renewed on time. The programs include E-verify, Special Immigrant Religious Workers, the EB-5 Investor Program, and Conrad-30 […]
If you are a legal permanent resident (LPR) and eligible for citizenship, now is a good time to give serious thought to becoming a U.S. citizen. Procrastination, cost, and an emotional bond to your home country may encourage you to remain in LPR status. That is understandable, but only for so long. The immigration system […]
In the waning months of 2016, the growing trend in the executive branch was disdain for the private prison system. The Department of Justice issued a memorandum stopping the practice altogether, which prompted action by other federal agencies. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) gave serious consideration to ending the practice of relying on private detention […]
