Two bureaucracies are “better” than one when it all “ends well.”

Sunday, October 18th, 2015

I recently wrote about how USCIS eschews interaction with attorneys and severely limits the ability of attorneys to interact with it during the adjudication process. Combine USCIS with the Department of State, and the inaccessibility of the bureaucracy is more frustratingly apparent. Here’s my recent example. A Mexican family (Mexican-ness is important to the story. It is not a gratuitous detail.) came to see me about a long-pending visa petition filed twenty years ago by a parent for his son….

2A or not 2A, that is the question. An immediate relative by another name is not as sweet

Sunday, August 18th, 2013

Of all the arcana that exists in the immigration law world, the subject that always seems to return is visa waiver adjustments. I have written about it quite often, such as here, where I provide the background of the issue and links to other articles. In a nutshell, visa waiver entrants are people who lawfully come to the United States without visas. This is a benefit provided to citizens of certain countries. The law about visa waiver entry is found…

Visa number retrogression is shockingly cruel

Sunday, December 12th, 2010

Someone called me a couple of weeks ago and asked me about the “new law” they heard about on TV that allows people to bring their families here without delay right away. I explained that there are some new laws under discussion – they have been under discussion since 1996 when “the great triangulator”  signed an immigration reform law, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (IIRAIRA) that made many harsh changes to the law. (Lets hope…