Posts tagged “I-140”

It doesn’t make sense. Why is the anti-immigrant President forcing people who just want to visit the US to immigrate?  This is one of the bizarre consequences of draconian visa policies and the “visa is a privilege, not a right” mantra regularly voiced by Secretary of State Rubio. Consular officers at embassies and consulates around the world have weaponized Section 214(b) of the Immigration and Nationality Act to deny B1/B2 visitor visas for any reason under the sun: a perceived lack of ties, nationality, interview deficiencies, having a relative in the US, questions about plans in the US. As can be seen in our recently-published update to our article on 214(b), by our count, there are more than 40 different reasons – many of them pretexts and outright bogus - consuls are denying nonimmigrant visa applicants.  And because 214(b) does not apply to immigrant visa cases and there is limited discretion for consuls to deny immigrant visas, it is unlikely that the consul will be able to refuse legitimate immigrant visa applications from those same individuals.

I’ve known this for years because we won one of the first visa-delay cases — ever. The year was 2005, 4 years after 9/11, which resulted in the creation of a new government security bureaucracy. This bureaucracy has grown exponentially over the years — with more and more agencies and personnel involved in the decision-making process, triggering more and more delays. The recent pandemic made the situation much, much worse — leading to colossal delays in adjudicating petitions and visas. As a result, the time has never been more ripe than now for the filing of mandamus lawsuits. The last month alone provides testament. In a B-1 visitor visa case that had been pending under Section 221(g) for more than 5 years, we filed suit against the Department of State. Within 3 ½ months of the filing of the lawsuit, our client was issued a visa. In an I-829 EB-5…