If we have learned anything in recent years, it is that elections have consequences.
To have an impact on an election, you must vote. To vote in the United States, in most cases you must be a registered voter and only U.S. citizens can register to vote. That means, if you did not become a U.S. citizen by birth, you must become a naturalized U.S. citizen.
FYI — All U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) offices are closed tomorrow, December 24th. This is new. If you had an appointment with USCIS or with an Application Support Center for biometrics, your appointment is going to be cancelled and then rescheduled.
Good & bad news on the immigration front. The good news is the threatened furlough of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) staff did not happen and the agency is open and conducting interviews.
The Trump Administration is going to increase U.S. immigration filing fees and, unless there is new litigation, the new fees will go into effect on October 2nd. Some of the increases are significant and you are encouraged to file petitions as soon as possible to avoid the higher fees.
As I told you in an earlier posting, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (“USCIS”) has closed its doors to the general public until at least June 4th. I expect that date to be extended even further.
Boston — Like most places, Boston is closed. With the exception of cars delivering take-out food, the streets are deserted.
As suspected, the U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Service (USCIS) is not going to re-open anytime soon. In the release copied below, USCIS confirms it will be closed at least until June 4th. If the pandemic situation is no better by then, the closing will be extended.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services today announced that it will reuse previously submitted biometrics in order to process valid Form I-765, Application for Employment Authorization, extension requests due to the temporary closure of Application Support Centers (ASC) to the public in response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. This announcement is consistent with existing USCIS authorities regarding the agency’s ability to reuse previously submitted biometrics.
I hope many of you have seen this, but thanks to AILA’s continued advocacy, CIS has agreed to accept original signatures. More to come, we hope, regarding other requests, such as 90 day extensions on RFE, NOID, etc.
We sent the message below to Foley Law Offices clients who have interviews scheduled with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service. The bottom line is the USCIS is closed at least until April 1st.