August 2013 VB Contest

Hey everyone, August Visa Bulletin Contest is still open. All you have to do is guess the date for EB2 India in August 2013 VB. The first person to guess the date (or the closest date) wins $25 gift card from Amazon.

Our July 2013 VB contest winner to win $25 Amazon gift card was user pm86.

This contest is open to anyone, anywhere in the world. To enter the contest, please click the link below:

http://www.mygcvisa.com/forum/default.aspx?g=topics&f=21

Child Status Protection Act (CSPA)

The Child Status Protection Act (CSPA) amended the Immigration Nationality Act by changing how an alien is determined to be a child for purposes of immigrant classification.   The Act permits an applicant for certain benefits to retain classification as a “child,” even if he or she has reached the age of 21.

Since its enactment on Aug. 6, 2002, USCIS provided several field guidance memoranda regarding the adjudication of immigration benefits in accordance with the CSPA.   A memo issued April 30, 2008 made some substantive changes to how USCIS applies CSPA.

Q:   What is the Child Status Protection Act (CSPA)?
A. A “child” is defined as an individual who is unmarried and under the age of 21.  Before CSPA took effect on August 6, 2002, a beneficiary who turned 21 at any time prior to receiving permanent residence could not be considered a child for immigration purposes.  This situation is described as “aging out.”  Congress recognized that many beneficiaries were aging out because of large backlogs and long processing times for visa petitions.  CSPA is designed to protect a beneficiary’s immigration classification as a child when he or she ages out due to excessive processing times.  CSPA can protect “child” status for family-based immigrants, employment-based immigrants, and some humanitarian program immigrants (refugees, asylees, VAWA).

Q. How to qualify for CSPA?

A. Please see the table below
 

Immediate Relative	Preference Classification for Permanent Residence or Derivative
If the petition (Form I-130, Petition for Alien Relative) was filed by a U.S. citizen parent for his or her child, the beneficiary’s age “freezes” on the date of filing. If the petition (Form I-130) was filed by a permanent resident parent and the parent naturalizes before the beneficiary turns 21, the beneficiary’s age “freezes” on the date the petitioner naturalized.	CSPA allows the time a visa petition was pending to be subtracted from the beneficiary’s biological age at the time of visa availability so that the applicant is not penalized for the time in which USCIS did not adjudicate the petition.

Q.   What are the eligibility criteria for CSPA?

A.   Several requirements must be met to be eligible for CSPA age out protection:

• Must be the beneficiary of a pending or approved visa petition on or after August 6, 2002.
• The beneficiary must not have had a final decision on an application for adjustment of status or an immigrant visa before August 6, 2002.
• The child must “seek to acquire” permanent residence within 1 year of a visa becoming available.  USCIS interprets “seek to acquire” as having a Form I-824, Application for Action on an Approved Application or Petition, filed on the child’s behalf or the filing of a Form I-485, Application to Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status, or submit Form DS-230, Application for Immigrant Visa and Alien Registration from the Department of State.  The date of visa availability means the first day of the first month a visa in the appropriate category was listed as available in the Department of State’s visa bulletin or the date the visa petition was approved, whichever is later.

CIS Ombudsman 2013 Annual Report

The Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman recently published its 2013 Annual Report.

If you did not know the CIS ombudsman is Maria M. Odom.

The report includes all EB, FB, DACA and other categories. It also talks about RFE, processing times, etc.

Please see the link below:

http://aila.org/content/default.aspx?docid=44948

Senate Passed CIR Bill

As expected Senate passed the Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR) bill today. The vote was 68 - 32. All 52 democrats, 2 independents and 14 republicans voted yes. Thirty-two Republicans voted against the measure, including every single member of the leadership.

The Senate conducted a rare seated vote where senators have to sit at their desks and immediately declare their vote when the clerk calls their name.

The bill’s sponsors expanded the pool of Republican support earlier this week by amending the legislation to authorize 20,000 additional border patrol agents and the construction of 700 miles of fencing along the southern border. The amendment also ensured that immigrants could not claim Social Security benefits for the time they worked in the country illegally.

That fell short of the demands of a majority of Republicans who called for a guarantee of 100 percent situational awareness, or full monitoring, and a 90-percent apprehension rate of illegal entrants be achieved along the southern border before granting permanent legal status to millions of immigrants.

The legislation received another boost last week when the Congressional Budget Office estimated it would reduce the deficit by $197 billion over the next decade and by $700 billion between 2024 and 2033.

 “It is not a bill that reflects a commitment to a lawful system of immigration in the future,” he said on the Senate floor. “We will admit dramatically more people than we ever have in our country’s history at a time when unemployment is high and the Congressional Budget Office have told us that wages, average wages will go down for 12 years, that gross domestic product per capita will decline for 25-plus years.”

Some Republicans complained that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) shut down the amendment process. The Senate voted on only 10 of the more than 500 amendments filed to the bill.

Immigration News Update 6/1 - 6/24

Senate CIR Bill: CIR bill has been introduced in Senate. As of  June  21, 478 amendments (changes) were introduced to the bill. However only about 20 amendments have been voted on so far. The senate leaders are confident that they can pass the bill in Senate by July 4. Latest reports says that they have around 70 votes to pass the bill (only 60 votes is required to pass the bill).

House CIR Bill: House leaders have made a decision to not take up Senate CIR bill. They however are still not clear on which direction to go: piecemeal bills or another comprehensive reform bill. The House Judiciary Committee have started working on following piecemeal bills: HR 1773, 1760, 1812, 1923 and 2131.

You can read about the current state of CIR bill here: http://blog.mygcvisa.com/2013/05/current-state-of-cir-bill-part-3.html

AILA Conference: American Immigration Lawyers Association will have their annual conference from June 26 to 29 in San Francisco, CA. Hopefully we can get more information from Charles Oppenheim about future visa bulletin date movements for EB/FB categories. You can view more details about the conference here: http://www.aila.org/content/default.aspx

USCIS I-485 & I-140 Processing Statistics As Of 04/30/13

USCIS I-140 Processing Statistics as of 04/30/2013

	TSC	NSC	National
Pending	6,894	4,387	11,334
Customer action waiting	1,534	3,122	4,656
Completed	4,792	3,991	8,786
New receipts	3,208	2,189	5,397

USCIS EB I-485 Processing Statistics as of 04/30/2013

DACA Processing Statistics As Of 5/30/13

If you dont know what DACA is, please read FAQ for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals

The following show total receipts and approvals as of 05/30/2013. This update also shows the applicants by country.

Total Received: 539,128 (On April 30, 2013: 515,922)
Total Accepted: 520,157 (On April 30, 2013: 497,960)

Approvals: 365, 237 (On 4/30/13: 291,859)
Denied: 3,816 (On 4/30/13: 2,352)

The following is the trend: Total applications received show a slow-down; however in last 3 month, the USCIS approved over 143,000 applications.

Data below was generated on June 10, 2013.

Tip: Click image to enlarge.

Top 10 Countries of Origin: Asian countries include India, Pakistan, Philippines and South Korea.