New Challenges

[Randy W]

The NBC News article was the lead for this topic.

 

At the time, the NY Times pointed out (see post # 15 above - http://candleforlove.com/forums/topic/49687-new-challenges/?do=findComment&comment=639996 )

 

 

 

The move is not intended to affect most immigrants who have already been granted green cards, but advocates have said they fear that those with legal resident status will stop using public benefits to protect their status.

[Randy W]

The NBC News article was the lead for this topic.

At the time, the NY Times pointed out (see post # 15 above - http://candleforlove.com/forums/topic/49687-new-challenges/?do=findComment&comment=639996 )

The move is not intended to affect most immigrants who have already been granted green cards, but advocates have said they fear that those with legal resident status will stop using public benefits to protect their status.

but yes it can affect those who have discrepancies discovered in the awarding of the green card. That is, the green card can be denied RETROACTIVELY, thus rendering them ineligible for citizenship.

[newacct]

The NBC News article was the lead for this topic.

 

At the time, the NY Times pointed out (see post # 15 above - http://candleforlove.com/forums/topic/49687-new-challenges/?do=findComment&comment=639996 )

 

 

 

The move is not intended to affect most immigrants who have already been granted green cards, but advocates have said they fear that those with legal resident status will stop using public benefits to protect their status.

but yes it can affect those who have discrepancies discovered in the awarding of the green card. That is, the green card can be denied RETROACTIVELY, thus rendering them ineligible for citizenship.

But whether they were eligible at the time they got their green card would be judged based on the old rules at the time they got their green card, so the new rule would not affect it.

[Greg.D.]

More FUD for immigration lawyers to cash in on.

[Randy W]

 

The NBC News article was the lead for this topic.

 

At the time, the NY Times pointed out (see post # 15 above - http://candleforlove.com/forums/topic/49687-new-challenges/?do=findComment&comment=639996 )

 

 

 

The move is not intended to affect most immigrants who have already been granted green cards, but advocates have said they fear that those with legal resident status will stop using public benefits to protect their status.

but yes it can affect those who have discrepancies discovered in the awarding of the green card. That is, the green card can be denied RETROACTIVELY, thus rendering them ineligible for citizenship.

But whether they were eligible at the time they got their green card would be judged based on the old rules at the time they got their green card, so the new rule would not affect it.

 

 

 

Yes, but read the NBC News article - they are going after these MUCH more aggressively, to the point of reneging on past "forgiveness".

[Randy W]

The "Three Part Test" referenced above ( http://candleforlove.com/forums/topic/49687-new-challenges/?p=642513) DOES seem to be a thing, but I'm not enough of a legal scholar to figure out which acts, re-acts, Federal Register entries, etc., still apply.

 

See [Federal Register Volume 64, Number 101 (Wednesday, May 26, 1999)] https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-1999-05-26/html/99-13202.htmfor one example.

 

See sections \8\ and \9\ of this document for a discussion of how it MIGHT apply to the I-864 immigrants.

 

What this all seems to mean is that once the I-864 is approved, the intending immigrant is VERY unlikely to run afoul of the new policy, if it's at all even possible.

 

First, for aliens who are not sponsored under the new AOS, it is

unlikely that there will be a legal obligation to repay public

benefits or that the benefit-granting agency will make a demand for

repayment. Thus, just as in the past, the first two prongs of the

Matter of B test generally will not be satisfied. Only aliens who

apply for immigrant visas or adjustment of status on or after

December 19, 1997, may be sponsored under the new, enforceable AOS,

which could satisfy the standards for deportation under Matter B.

However, under the new welfare reform laws, these same aliens will

generally be barred from receiving federal means-tested public

benefits for the first 5 years after admission or adjustment--the

critical period for purposes of deportability.

In addition, under the ``deeming'' rules, and the sponsor's

spouse's income and resources will be attributed to the alien in

assessing his or her eligibility to receive a means-tested benefit,

which would normally raise the alien's income over the benefit

eligibility threshold. Only if an immigrant receives a cash benefit

for income-maintenance within 5 years of entry or is

institutionalized for long-term care (despite the eligibility

limitations), there is a demand for repayment by the benefit-

granting agency, and the sponsor or other responsible party fails to

repay, can the immigrant become deportable as a public charge.

However, even in this case, the alien must be given an opportunity

to prove that he or she became a public charge for causes that arose

after entry. If an alien can make such a showing, he or she will not

be deportable as a public charge. Thus, the Service is unlikely to

see a significant increase in cases of deportability on public

charge grounds.

 

 

[Allon]

Old or not, it points out cases that are being handled by lawyers even now.

 

Public charge is taken into account on citizenship, and if denied, the green card is then vulnerable to revocation. The tone is that the administration, in much the same way they handled banning Muslims by banning Muslim predominant countries from being allowed in the country, are moving to challenge the original decision on the 2 year LPR. I heard a case this morning on NPR where a woman was being deported for being a public charge on the basis of her 2 year green card application at a time when she was applying for citizenship.

 

 

In light of this, immigration attorneys are cautioning their clients before moving from green-card status to citizenship.

Rose Hernandez is the supervising attorney at the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition's naturalization clinic. She said the clinic's model has completely changed in light of the crackdown. She now sends six information requests to government agencies to check on green-card holders' backgrounds before she advises them to file for citizenship. If the government finds something she doesn't, the fear is the applicants could lose their green cards and be sent home.

[Allon]

I am familiar with reading the Federal Register and it takes a Ph D to really understand them, so don't feel like the lone stranger. I have had more fights with DOL bureaucrats about their wording than I would care to count.

 

But I am getting that these new rules really run counter to any previous publications. When I did some qualifying rules for our people who interviewed incoming refugees, it was accepted practice for them to automatically be eligible for public assistance of many kinds. And they had already received some payments by the time we saw them. With these new rules being applied to older receiver's of refugee status visas and eventual AOS, it leaves them vulnerable to deportation.

 

One equivocating factor is the exemption of spouses who are US citizens. If that refugee or LPR is married and receives assistance through the spouse, they should be OK. But I don't see where a LPR is totally safe even if they do not apply or get public assistance. If they end up divorced, and struggle to make it, they are vulnerable to deportation despite contracts by the sponsor to take care of them. (We all know of sad cases where some LPR's were just deserted by their husbands. Abused spouses are exempt, one saving grace.)

 

THis situation will cause some heartaches.

[KevinNelson]

 

...

 

Public charge is taken into account on citizenship, and if denied, the green card is then vulnerable to revocation. The tone is that the administration, in much the same way they handled banning Muslims by banning Muslim predominant countries from being allowed in the country, are moving to challenge the original decision on the 2 year LPR....

 

To clear up a misunderstanding... President Obama had originally set up the ban on those countries, and President Trump simply restated it... then people claimed President Trump was discriminating against Muslims. Wrong.

 

Next point: All of us who have spouses from China had to have our spouses background-checked, in China by Chinese officials before they could apply for their greencard. All the countries that President Obama first singled out, then President Trump re-announced bans on, at that time did nor have functioning governments with functioning legal systems with functioning police forces capable of providing credible certification of individuals from those countries being law-abiding citizens within their own countries. The fact that most of them were primarily Muslim countries was secondary to the point they had no functioning internal security mechanisms to show that travelers from those countries were law abiding citizens.

[KevinNelson]

An interesting case came up locally with immigrant Chinese we know from Taiwan. The son was born in Taiwan, but came over at an early age. He is a bit of mess. He has had a green card for nearly two decades. He is in his late 20's. He applied for citizenship. About three weeks before his citizenship interview, he was involved as the driver in a DUI crash. His application for citizenship was denied. That was also about three weeks ago. His parents immediately got an immigration lawyer, but we still do not know what the final verdict will be. Will he be deported? Will he keep his green card? Will he be allowed to legally remain in the States?

[Randy W]

An interesting case came up locally with immigrant Chinese we know from Taiwan. The son was born in Taiwan, but came over at an early age. He is a bit of mess. He has had a green card for nearly two decades. He is in his late 20's. He applied for citizenship. About three weeks before his citizenship interview, he was involved as the driver in a DUI crash. His application for citizenship was denied. That was also about three weeks ago. His parents immediately got an immigration lawyer, but we still do not know what the final verdict will be. Will he be deported? Will he keep his green card? Will he be allowed to legally remain in the States?

 

 

You would need to know the details of his case. Googling it only got news articles from Taiwan for me.

 

Deportation vs. Inadmissibility After a DUI

[KevinNelson]

 

An interesting case came up locally with immigrant Chinese we know from Taiwan. The son was born in Taiwan, but came over at an early age. He is a bit of mess. He has had a green card for nearly two decades. He is in his late 20's. He applied for citizenship. About three weeks before his citizenship interview, he was involved as the driver in a DUI crash. His application for citizenship was denied. That was also about three weeks ago. His parents immediately got an immigration lawyer, but we still do not know what the final verdict will be. Will he be deported? Will he keep his green card? Will he be allowed to legally remain in the States?

 

 

You would need to know the details of his case. Googling it only got news articles from Taiwan for me.

 

Deportation vs. Inadmissibility After a DUI

 

 

This is entirely local, with the interview having been done somewhere in northern California. No news will likely hit the papers on this case, since it is a loss of face to those involved, and the people are personally known to my wife.

[Allon]

To clear up a misunderstanding... President Obama had originally set up the ban on those countries, and President Trump simply restated it... then people claimed President Trump was discriminating against Muslims. Wrong.

 

 

Sorry. Right, though people did accuse Trump of discriminating against Muslims. Originally in his first submittals of his ban, he mentioned Muslims by name. It was only after he mentioned countries rather than religion (in that sense he did agree with Obama) did the SUpreme Court rule in his favor. But Obama did not "set up" the ban that Trump tried to pass.

 

Obama held up one kind of visa (refugees don't use visas by the way) from one predominantly Muslim country: Iraq, and for one specific incident. NO other Muslim countries were affected and it in fact, when they were, was not a ban. Trump erroneously (other people have a different name for it) said Obama had done so for several Muslim countries. He did not. Immigration from those countries were not inhibited except to require a visa if you visited them (Iraq and Syria only.)

 

"Obama's policy tended to prioritize people who had been convicted of specific criminal offenses or about whom the US government had specific knowledge that suggested the person was a threat," Stefanie Fisher, a Boston-based immigration attorney at Araujo & Fisher LLC, told Business Insider.

"It was not based on nationality."

Trump is correct, however, that the seven countries named in his executive order had been previously identified by the Obama administration.

Those countries were named in a 2015 law that revised the US visa-waiver program to "respond to the growing threat from foreign terrorist fighters," according to the Department of Homeland Security. But the policy did not bar the countries' nationals — it required travelers who had visited those countries since 2011 to apply for a US visa before entering.

https://www.businessinsider.com/big-differences-between-trumps-immigration-ban-obamas-2011-policy-2017-2#intent-2

 

 

 

Also, fact checker below:

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/02/07/trumps-claim-that-obama-first-identified-the-seven-countries-in-his-travel-ban/

 

The website of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection bureau still says the main purpose of the 2015 law was to identify people who may have been radicalized: “DHS remains concerned about the risks posed by the situation in Syria and Iraq, where instability has attracted thousands of foreign fighters, including many from VWP countries.” The CBP also noted: “These new eligibility requirements do not bar travel to the United States.”

So while the Obama administration expanded the list of countries, it sought to keep the focus on travel, not nationality. Trump, by contrast, has taken the opposite approach — keeping the focus on a person’s nationality.

 

 

 

 

And,

 

According to the executive order, Trump’s action applies to "countries designated pursuant to Division O, Title II, Section 203 of the 2016 consolidated Appropriations Act."

That refers to a 2015 act, signed into law by Obama, revising the United States’ visa waiver program. The visa waiver program allows citizens from 38 countries to enter the United States without a visa for up to 90 days. Under the legislation, citizens of those 38 countries who had traveled to Iraq, Syria, Iran, and Sudan after March 2011 were no longer eligible for the visa waiver. Libya, Yemen, and Somalia were later added to the list.

In other words, Obama’s actions dealt with people who had visited Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, not citizens of those countries, and it did not prohibit them from entering the United States.

....

Our ruling

Trump said, "My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months."

The Obama administration in 2011 delayed processing Iraqi refugees for six months following evidence of a failed plot by two Iraqi refugees.

Trump’s executive order temporarily bars travel to the United States for all citizens from seven countries, and it is not in direct response to actions from citizens of those countries.

Furthermore, Iraqi refugees were nonetheless admitted to the United States during the 2011 suspension while Trump has put an indefinite ban on Syrian refugees.

We rate Trump’s claim Mostly False.

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2017/jan/30/donald-trump/why-comparing-trumps-and-obamas-immigration-restri/

 

[Randy W]

from the WaPo

 

 

 

Supreme Court allows Trump administration to proceed with ‘wealth test’ rules for immigrants

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/supreme-court-allows-trump-administration-to-proceed-with-immigration-rules/2020/01/27/6adb9688-412c-11ea-aa6a-083d01b3ed18_story.html?utm_campaign=wp_main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook

 

 

 

The rules establish new criteria for who can be considered dependent on the U.S. government for benefits — “public charges,” in the words of the law — and thus ineligible for green cards and a path to U.S. citizenship. They were proposed to start in October but were delayed by the lower-court decisions.

Under the new policy, immigrants would be suspect if they are in the United States legally and use public benefits — such as Medicaid, food stamps or housing assistance — too often or are deemed likely to someday rely on them. The new criteria provide “positive” and “negative” factors for immigration officials to weigh as they decide on green-card applications. Negative factors include if a person is unemployed, dropped out of high school or is not fluent in English.

Immigrant groups have protested the rules and denounced the Supreme Court’s action.

 

 

 

 

[newacct]

The new rule takes effect February 24, 2020, except in Illinois.

 

https://www.uscis.gov/news/news-releases/uscis-announces-public-charge-rule-implementation-following-supreme-court-stay-nationwide-injunctions