Foreign nationals who are not eligible to adjust their status to permanent resident in the United States must travel abroad to obtain an immigrant visa. This includes individuals who have unlawfully entered the United States or have remained in the United States for six months or longer beyond their lawful admission. These individuals must obtain a waiver of inadmissibility before they can obtain an immigrant visa to return to the U.S. Typically, these individuals cannot apply for a waiver until after they have appeared for their immigrant visa interview at a U.S. Consulate abroad (consular processing), and have been determined to be inadmissible to the United States. However, the I-601A provisional unlawful presence waiver process allows immediate relatives of U.S. citizens who need a waiver of inadmissibility to apply for that waiver in the United States before they depart for their immigrant visa interview at a U.S. Consulate. (See our prior blogs on this issue here).
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has recently proposed to expand the eligibility for I-601A provisional waivers in the following ways:
No timeline or deadline has been set as to when the proposed changes will take effect. USCIS has issued a public notice on the proposed changes and will allow comments from the public on the proposed changes until September 21, 2015. The changes to the rule would take effect on the date indicated in the final rule when the final rule is published in the Federal Register. The expanded provisional waiver will allow a larger pool of immigrant visa applicants to apply for the Provisional Unlawful Presence Waiver before they depart the U.S. for consular processing. Although pre-approval of the waiver before departing the U.S. does not guarantee the applicant will receive the visa, it does increases the likelihood that the visa will be granted.
Please contact an immigration attorney at Minsky, McCormick & Hallagan, P.C. if you or someone you know may benefit from an I-601A provisional waiver.
The material contained in this alert does not constitute direct legal advice and is for informational purposes only. An attorney-client relationship is not presumed or intended by receipt or review of this presentation. The information provided should never replace informed counsel when specific immigration-related guidance is needed.
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