Starting tomorrow, July 15th, the U.S. Department of State will begin a phased reopening of its Embassies and Consulates worldwide, on a post-by-post basis.

 

Services presumed to be resuming include nonimmigrant visa appointments, immigrant visa appointments for those exempt from the recent executive orders prohibiting the issuance of immigrant visas, and other services such as U.S. passport and other citizenship-related services (e.g., consular report of birth abroad, notarization services, etc.). However, certain services at any given location may be rolled out more slowly than others, likely depending on available Department of State resources, and case backlogs.

 

 

Presidential proclamations and policy changes that continue to impact the availability of visas, despite the gradual resumption of services include:

Members of the American Immigration Lawyers Association have been sharing information over the past week regarding the opening of diplomatic posts around the world, including the availability of certain E visa appointments. Individuals with submitted Department of State forms DS-160 who are awaiting system availability for E visa interviews—not including new E visa applicants, who are required to wait for Department of State notification before scheduling their interviews—should check the visa appointment scheduling website for their desired country to see whether visa appointments are available, and continue checking at least daily over the coming weeks. Please be aware that should there be a spike in COVID-19 cases in any given location, it is possible that the Department of State could cancel scheduled appointments in the future—but all signs point to the Department of State making a concerted effort to resume regular services if and when reasonable in the near future.  

 

 

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services recently sent furlough notices to approximately 13,400—or more than 70%--of its employees. Without additional government funding, these furloughs are expected to go into effect on August 3rd and last up to 90 days. This would create a massive logjam of U.S. immigration cases, dwindling processes reviewed by the agency to a trickle in an environment already riddled with months- or years-long processing delays. While USCIS is funded by user fees (unlike most federal agencies), there is a severe funding shortfall—rumored to be largely created by mismanagement of funds and changes to internal policies that have stymied efficient processing over the past several years, despite USCIS’s claim that the funding shortfall has been caused by issues arising out of the coronavirus outbreak.  As a result, the agency has requested a $1.2 billion bailout by the federal government.

 

Following an initial dramatic (and brief) improvement in the pace of approvals near the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic—presumably resulting from the freeing-up of resources due to a sudden drop in petition and application submissions to the agency—the immigration community has seen a marked slow-down in petition and application processing over the last few months, with few exceptions. Green card applications appear to have ground to an effective halt for the time being, with Presidential Proclamation 10014 pausing issuance of immigrant visas outside the U.S. through at least the end of the year. If furloughs occur, this will likely also deeply impact timelines for processing of adjustment of status applications, for those already in the U.S. seeking to adjust their status to permanent resident (obtain Green Cards from within the U.S.).

Government immigration actions are likely to continue to be fluid depending on the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic throughout the remainder of 2020 and into 2021. We also anticipate that U.S. unemployment numbers resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on businesses will continue to drive the “America First” approach to policymaking and influence regulatory changes to immigration in the U.S. 

 

President Trump also recently indicated that he plans to focus on moving the U.S. toward a merit-based immigration system, rather than continuing with a system driven by family reunification and employment-based migration. While this is not a new goal, the path to getting a merit-based system in place may be or become unconventional, in light of the more liberal use of executive orders to further the goals and priorities of members of the government’s executive branch across recent presidential administrations.