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hi there everyone thanks for joining us as we plan to talk today about the Biden administration's New Order announcing parole in place um in order to help some uh undocumented spouses of US citizen and some of their children and some additional um changes updates to our current immigration system so we'll be talking about that um my name is Emily Newman I'm the managing partner of ready Newman Brown here in Houston Texas we're one of the largest immigration law firms in Houston and with me today is one of my business partner Stephen Brown um who is uh handling all of our litigation non-immigrant visas um lots of different types of cases here and so we want to go through what's in this executive order what isn't what it does do for people who it's likely to help and who it unfortunately leaves out um uh so Stephen can you give us kind of a little introduction into what this order is and who's eligible for it yes yeah thank you Emily so there's really the way I view it is two actions that are being taken here and this is largely to help out the uh those that are undocumented uh we we have propos we have announcement one which which is for spouses um and I believe it's spouses and children of US citizens if I'm not mistaken and then number two are the folks that are in DACA and have us degrees and so the Biden Administration you know making good on its 2020 campaign promises is trying to work on a path for these individuals I know you and I talk about it all the time Congress continues to be complacent on anything immigration and because Congress continues to be complacent what we're left with is executive actions and you know everything I've read there's a lot of good Authority for this pearl of place remember this is very similar to The Authority that was used for the military Pearl in place that was exended under the Trump Administration this is just a new flavor of that you know instead of military members we're talking about the immediate relatives now when we talk about this one of the initial concerns a lot one of the initial things that I think was a Mis representation is that oh Biden is is creating a new path to a green card and that has to go through Congress and that's absolutely not what's happening here when you are a spouse of a US citizen you are already eligible for a green card most of these individuals would have their green card but for the unlawful present issue uh that that is a a hurdle for them and so this removes that hurdle um and then just you know to kind of put a bow on it with these immediate relatives they aren't subject to Caps or the Visa bulletin so this doesn't have any of the negative impacts on the Visa bulletin or progression or lack thereof on that now we'll talk more about the DACA side of that and they impact that might have unemployment based um but overall I mean I think this is a it's a good step um you know and we'll talk about who it leaves out because I think there's a lot of folks that unfortunately leaves out um but this is a making good on a campaign promise yeah so one of the questions I've um been asked is you know this is called parole parole in place um does it do anything to help people applying for advanced parole we know that Advanced parole processing times are ridiculous over a year to get a simple travel Document that probably takes 30 seconds to approve and now all of a sudden we're going to be adding these new parols into the mix um so is this the same type of parole and if undocumented undocumented immigrants can get this parole can legal immigrants get this kind of parole and unfortunately this is a different kind of parole it's not called Advanced parole because it with advanced parole you are asking the government permission in advance to allow you to exit and come back in without abandoning your pending 485 Green Card application parole in place is another type of um permission you're asking from the government but the in place part of it means that they're letting you do it while you're in place while you're in the US you don't have to exit to ask any advance to be paroled back into the country you can do it while you're in place um and what it really does for people who are undocumented spouses of US citizens is it provides them now with a method to file an adjustment of status because what's preventing undocumented spouses of US citizens from receiving that green card right now is the um entry without inspection so a lot of these people you know the the general rule for spouse of US citizen if you came into this country legally and you've overstayed by 20 years and you've worked without authorization for 20 years and then you marry a US citizen you are qualified to file for adjustment of status assuming you don't have any other grounds of inadmissibility these people don't have that option because they entered without inspection so the only way for them to receive a green card right now is through Consular processing they cannot do adjustment of status Consular processing means they're going to have to leave the US in order to receive their green card through the consulate however when they leave the US they're going to trigger the 10-year bar to them coming lawfully back into the country once they get their green card they won't be able to get that green card for 10 years so we're basically forcing families who've been together already married to a US citizen to separate for 10 years or we're forcing the US citizen spouse to move to their other country for 10 years in order for this person to finally qualify for a green card and come back in the other way to qualify is if you can show that your US citizen spouse would uh undergo extreme hardship because of this family separation that is the i601 or 601a waiver process which most of these people qualify for problem is the 601 waivers are taking three years so we are delaying things further the government can't keep up with that process so instead of making them go through all of that rigamarole when they're already here just give them Parole in place once they do that they're no longer entry without inspection now they've been paroled and for family-based immigration marriage to a US citizen you can file adjustment of status based on an entry by parole um so with this parole in place it requires um the marriage to a US citizen it requires that they be in the US for at least 10 years as of June 17th 2024 so it's not going to help anyone who came in nine years ago nine years and 364 days ago you've got to have already been in the US living here for 10 years um as of June 17th um and then uh beyond that they're going to check for criminal background National Security risks all the same kind of things that they did for DACA so assuming they have a clean record and their only violation is entry without inspection they would be able to get this parole which is valid for three years and that gives them employment authorization or the ability to apply for an EAD and then during that threeyear time they can then have their spouse file the i130 if they haven't already and the i485 to adjustment of status they receive their green card while they are in the US so that's kind of how the program works as Stephen said it's not a new process this parole in place it's not a new idea um they've been using it for military spouses for some time 10 years I believe even the Trump Administration was still issuing those um even though there's Authority for this uh what are your thoughts on litigation and will this actually come in come into effect so you know I think the commentary that I've read and looked at there's a lot of good Authority for this this is a lot of wide discretion in this and um we we'll talk a little bit later because I know one of the common questions is those in the backlog Community I think there's similar discretion there too um that just because it's allowed doesn't mean there's not going to be litigation um it will ultimately be to now whether I don't really think those lawsuits are going to be successful but that's not going to stop uh these anti-immigration um Attorneys General right across the nation who sue on everything immigration related it's not going to uh you know stop anti-immigration groups from potentially suing to stop this I mean we've already seen rhetoric from some of these groups this is a mass amnesty program and this is just giving you know the the language I've seen the we're giving illegals green cards no that's not what's happening here this is all about family separation um and making this path for people who are otherwise eligible for a green card today right there's no new nothing created right last week they were eligible for this green card it's creating an easier path for them to get it and that's all this is doing so I don't think we're going to see um successful litigation in the long run that doesn't mean we don't see something like a judge in Amarillo you know granting a you know an injunction and it getting fought all the way through um that doesn't you know so couple things on this one you know we've seen all the fact sheets and what DHS has put out but we have yet to see anything in the Federal Register that is formalizing this what are going to be the regulatory processes how do we do this do we file an i131 or do they have a new form what do we file what are the fees we don't know uh that is not published yet um I know some folks are speculating 30 to 60 days maybe um on this and we'll see something the Federal Register and then there will probably be some sort of comment period or uh you know enactment period whatever it might be uh on that uh so we don't have anything today and I guess my point is that if you are talking to a lawyer who says they can take your money today for this case I I don't think you should do that uh because we don't know we don't know anything about how this is going to go just yet um but so keep an eye out uh for that and then so once that regulation comes through then we might see the litigation efforts all right so I mentioned earlier that what this is ultimately doing is is eliminating the 601 waiver process for this group of people so let me talk about how many people is this in the first place so we do not have a actual real count of the number of undocumented people in the United States I think the best estimate is about 10 and a half million that comes from the Pew Research Center they've been tracking it for quite some time um so 10 and a half million but when the government made this announcement they said that about 500,000 is how many they expect will actually qualify for it so we have 10 A5 million only 500,000 that's less than 5% of our undocumented population that might actually qualify this because not every undocumented person is married to a US citizen not every undocumented person has been here for more than 10 years um so if we are eliminating the 601 waiver need for 500,000 people and we are now adding some sort of application for parole in place that they will file instead plus once they get that parole in place now 500,000 more people are going to be applying for adjustment of status what do you think that's going to be doing to processing times for everybody else who is waiting for their 485 to be approved who's waiting for their Advanced parole to be approved it is concerning and I you know I'm hoping but I don't trust the current powers that be that they would properly staff this but one thing we look at you know when we talk about delay litigation is what are the competing priorities right of the agency and if DHS goes out and says this is our top priority this is number one right uh that could signific ly impact anything else down the road that isn't this now again my hope is that they try to staff this right I don't not gonna hold my breath on uh that happening because we just haven't seen that proper management yet but I do think that they are going to prioritize these and and maybe push on these and we are talking about so much and then what are those processing times how does a potential change in administration uh maybe in January impact this and so there's a lot of wh ifs out there still um but I do think we could see some um downsides on the processing granted my view on Advanced parole is those should go from being receded to printed anyway um so maybe they do something right but I'm not holding my breath yeah um and you know DHS says 500,000 people maybe an additional 50,000 kids might qualify um these are kids of the undocumented spouse so their stepchild of the US citizen and they also entered without inspection potentially so 550,000 but how many green cards does USCIS issue every year over a million and most of those are in the immediate relative category so we're not even talking about a Year's worth of applications um and they might not all come at the same time either I think the whatever parole in place application might come all at once um but then the actual adjustment of status processes might be carried out over time and it's kind of somewhat a drop in the bucket compared to the total number of 485s and green cards that they issue every year so hopefully um that won't be an issue but the fact that they say again and again in their announcement that this Parole in place it has set requirements the 10 years the married to a US citizen but we're going to look at every person on a caseby casee basis to make a determination in our discretion whether they qualify well guess where else they use their discretion and blame that on Long processing times uh Advanced parole that's why they claim that they can't just print an advanced parole for employment based as soon as you file it because it's discretionary well how many times are they using their discretion to deny these like less than 1% of the time let's get the other 99% done but they're already taking three years to process the 61 waivers which are also on a caseby casee basis and discretionary we're just going to change that burden from 601s to whatever form you have to file for this Parole in place um that is concerning to me that they're just going to use this caseby casee basis to review everything so much that they never get the approval or it takes forever and we're going to have to be suing on those in addition to suing on Advanced parole delays and 485 delays um so one other thing that's in this announcement that I think has the potential to impact our audience which is more employment based um is the fact that they are planning on allowing people who are here undocumented whether they have DACA or not but who have gone to school here got a us um higher degree so a bachelor's degree or higher from an accredited University they're going to allow them to more easily get a Visa at a consulate and come back on a work visa um so we have a new group of people who are now going to be potentially qualifying for HBS it could impact the H1B Lottery coming up next year as employers now are sponsoring undocumented people for h-1bs which they were never able to do before or you could sponsor them but then it'd be worthless because they could never get the visa now once they the company sponsors and they reive the a petition approval these people will we think this is all guessing at this point because there's very little details my only thought as to how I think this is going to go is because they mentioned the Department of State which handles Visas so I think they're going to exit and when they apply for the Visa stamp like all of us have to do um normally these people would be denied a visa on the ground of inadmissibility of unlawful presence or potential entry without inspection but most likely unlawful presence that requires a waiver um I think their plan is to kind of make that waiver process streamlined for people in this unique situation so that they can easily get the visa come back into the US in that non-immigrant status so now they've are using some of the h-1bs they might be using TNS they might be using e visas they might be using o1 visas any kind of work visa that we typically associate with employment-based immigration this new population will be eligible for now once they get that uh waiver and come in in on a Visa now they have a legal entry and can potentially be sponsored for the Green Card by their employer they can be sponsored in eb2 they can be sponsored in eb3 eb1 just like everyone that is in our audience um these are more likely to be rest of world countries um which means more people are going to be using rest of world green cards and because they were able to come back in on a non-immigrant Visa that 10year bar that I talked about earlier still applies to them for the green card but they can be serving that 10 years while they're lawfully in the US under a new policy that was announced a couple of months ago years ago I can't it's not too long ago not um so it this has the potential to impact Visa bulletin to impact retrogression to impact uh the ability of everyone else who's already waiting to get a green card because rest World numbers maybe used up even more that's less spill over spill across that can go to eb2 eb3 India China um so I don't know if you have anything to add to that Stephen yeah I mean you know let's The Immigrant Visa the Green Card part aside this is you know I think an H1B Lottery aside I mean for the the docka kids this is a great policy for them right it when we talk about the the 212d 3 waiver we're talking about years of processing and a lot of discretion uh that makes it nearly impossible for these employers like you said now they can you know go go get the uh h a TN an 01 whatever it might be maybe maybe start a business um you know through an EA potentially I think you'd have to finagle that one a little bit um but this is good you know from that side of it and I again I do applaud them trying something it's just we need to keep an eye out on how what are the followon effects of this like Emily said we're gonna see you know we we could see folks that were never in the H1B Lottery now enter you know they never even considered it because it just was Impractical um that's already bad as it is so um we'll keep an eye on it again we don't know we we just do not know have all the details on what they are going to um do now I did see one question and I know we'll get to more here shortly but uh a question about hey I've been engaged but otherwise I meet all the requirements um can I uh can I qualify and the answer unfortunately is no this is very now I think it is very clear you have to have a legally valid Merit marriage to a US citizen as of June 17th 2024 now I have seen some attorneys who have argued that if you are married to an LPR who gets their citizenship you might be able to qualify as long as that marriage was before then the plain reading on dhs's website I think you have to have been married to a US citizen as of two days ago um so we'll see but if you've been engaged and not married before June 17th unfortunately this doesn't apply this this doesn't qualify you all right now I want to get to the elephant in the room at least for probably our audience is what's not included in this executive order this does nothing for legal immigrants who are waiting just as long how many of our clients have been here for 10 years so many and still you know can't even file a 485 and then the ones that have been able to file it are stuck waiting another eight years because DH do doesn't know how to move the Visa bulletin um so we have no relief for people with approved i1 140s even though um that's been a recommendation made to uh the president we have what's more you know we've talked about daaka but we have documented dreamers we have kids that are you know kids of long-term Visa holders came here lawfully still here lawfully aging out nothing for them even though all you see on Twitter these days is people promoting relief for documented dreamers rightfully so they should be but how is it they left that out of this um well that's not an unfamiliar concept either with the government remember it was in that one immigration bill that came out in what February I think where they tried to do something for the documented uh dreamers and unfortunately that didn't come to fruition but um you're right it's left out here um and then you know as you mentioned there's no no announcement in the Federal Register yet so that means we don't know what form people will have to file if they do qualify we don't know what the fee is going to be and we don't know what documents are going to be required but we can guess at some of those so if you are someone who miraculously can qualify for this and meet The Limited um requirements of it what you can be looking for and Gathering now number one is proof of your continuous residence in the US for the last 10 years so that would be utility bills lease agreements tax returns we know undocumented immigrants file their taxes um so you'll have that as um proof of your resident in the US of course you have to be legally married so you'll want to have that marriage certificate showing that you were married as of June 17th you're going to need proof of your spouse's US citizenship so either their birth certificate in the US certified copy of it uh their passport or their naturalization certificate um your proof of identity so you're going to need a driver's license uh a passport uh consol ID something like that and then we expect there's going to be some kind of background check I don't know if it's going to require a police clearance certificate uh like is common for Consular processing of green cards I suspect not I think it's going to be more like DACA where in filling out the form they ask you have you been arrested have you um been convicted have you ever served prison jail that sort of thing they ask you those questions then of course they're going to run their own background check but I don't think they're going to require you to be fingerprinted and all of that stuff up front that's my guess uh we'll just have to wait and see on that um and then I just want to touch on as you mentioned Congress is absent um but we do need Congress to be the one to fix these things um because these executive actions are they have their limitations number one we can expect litigation um so that's going to slow this down number two it's at the whim of whoever the executive happens to be so if we get another president in January they could turn around and dismantle all of this just like has been tried to do before um so sadly um it's a you know somewhat step in the right direction to at least help a small portion of people does not go far enough um and we definitely need more but uh we can go ahead and go to some of the questions we have here I wanted to address to I got uh SK and and I'll make combine his with amitz here but why can't we have an executive order on recommendation uh recommendation for a j Jane and the team on the eadap for Approved i140 holders over five years and admit on YouTube similar question anything H1B uh with i140 with 10 years in USA again nothing here but I I fully agree we I think the president the executive branch has very good authority to an act those recommendations we have seen through litigation on stem op h4ead courts routinely hold that the executive branch has very broad Authority on EAD and work authorization and same thing for advanced parole so if the administration were to propose okay if you've got an i140 and it's been five years or hey you got an i14 40 and it's been X number years whatever and they want to do an EAD and AP I think they are well within their uh authority to do so and I think it would be a step in the right direction I think giving you more of that mobility and freedom and not having to uh keep filing a renewal every three years but again also they could come up with something potentially for for the documented dreamers too and I I you know maybe per do a in place or something for them you know some of these kids and I've met them they've been here since they were five or six years old their parents thought okay the Visa bulletin in 2012 was really a fiveyear difference and thought eventually I'm gonna get a a green card I don't have to worry about this these kids have grown up going to school you know and been here uh their for all of their life for the most part I I really do hope that they take that seriously and start trying to come up with Solutions but unfortunately it's not here um hopefully that changes in the future all right and yes um if you are on our YouTube channel or you go to our YouTube channel in the show notes for this we have so many different templates for you to use to contact the different agencies different um councils and authorities that can help us uh get some of the reforms that will help the legal immigrants like the EAD and AP for people that have had an i140 for so long like not counting the dependence in the Green Card quota you don't count dependence for H4 to the number of h-1bs that are issued you don't count dependence for anything and the statute doesn't really say you have to count dependence it's just how they happen to interpret it so let's get them to reinterpret it that would triple the number of green cards available um so um definitely make your voice heard on those there is an upcoming um White House initiative on Asian American Pacific Islander sorry it's got a really long name whh a PPI or something like that um they are seeking feedback from the Asian Community about the immigration um system and we're working on creating a a comment for that that you can take use and submit hopefully we'll get that posted soon but we need you guys to speak up um a lot of the time we are advocating for reform we're complaining about all the problems but no one's actually doing anything about it um you know there was a a Rally in Austin earlier this year specifically for people stuck in the in the backlog trying to um raise awareness of that and the 7% cap and how it's hurting Families how it's hurting the economy and there were only like six people that showed up and I was one of them I shouldn't be the one showing up you guys need to be showing up um so you guys need to start acting more uh get the word out more um but going back to the questions verani says will this have any impact on processing times for H1s H4 H4 EAD extensions um I think regular processing times potentially yeah as Stephen mentioned they have supposedly limited resources uh they are not very efficient and so if they're going to prioritize um these parole in place applications over H1B applications you can see H1B H4 H4 EAD processing times getting longer because they're focusing their efforts on these cases but if you're filing in premium um that should not change because that is regulatory it has to be 15 business days now not calendar days anymore um and you can get all three approved of course you shouldn't have to pay an extra $285 um but that's really the reality of it as we need to um you know Sanjay notes that he's written as a Texas resident to his representatives and Senators about the EAD and AP um and all the replies are we need to fix the Border first then let's talk you yeah that's a shocking um for especially the the Texas Representatives but again I think it's fully within the authority of the White House and I think the more people tell their story um I I saw one this week uh from improve the dream uh there was a kid who had to go abroad he's working in the the semiconductor industry well not too long ago uh Congress passed the chips act and and you know um Biden signs an EO about the chips act about how we want to become leaders in the semiconductor industry well if we want to be leaders in the semiconductor industry why are we having folks leave the us that are in that field just based off of these arbitrary rules I mean I know Congress set them but there's workarounds so I think telling the story is important and telling what you do um is important yeah and kind of a followup on that um someone says that they're fearful that public activism will negatively impact current future approvals extensions that sort of thing understandable um I mean but you have to think back I mean this is kind of a civil rights issue look at the Civil Rights Giants that came before um they I'm sure were fearful too but they did it anyways and I think there should be less fear in this situation because the type of activism we're talking about is not anything that's going to get you into trouble you're not going to get in trouble because you sent in a letter you're not going to get in trouble because you showed up at a protest as long as it had its permits and was you know done legally and that sort of thing um so I think that's maybe not a valid excuse um well and remember Emily the the the DACA kids pushed for action and you know they completely undocumented illegal here like ice could come for them any minute and they're on social media saying I am undocumented but this is my life this is my story this is why this is important to me um so yeah if DACA kids can do it you can do it yeah and I know there was you know the past administration was maybe trying to do things to end the program but there was nothing about individuals right there wasn't well I'm gonna get rid of so and so's extension right because they are protesting that I ever heard of so um I I I get the fear San I I really do understand it but um I don't think it's I think it's time to move past the fear and we are in America freedom of speech is a very important tenant for everyone who's physically in this country regardless of what your immigration status is so take advantage of that another question this is from SG any update on State Side Visa stamping since legal immigrants are not being favored in this uh provision somewhat of an update came at aa's conference last week um they made it sound like everybody loves it and they want to expand it continue it but um might not be till the end of the year that we see any action taking on it so they've got to get all their ducks in a row and I'm sure with our government efficiency it they'll take forever to do it but they are planning to continue that okay um I think the rest of the questions aren't really related to the topic um but yeah I think uh that's all we had and wanted to share um thanks everyone for joining us uh hopefully we've lit a fire under you to take some more action take things into your own hands and advocate for some reforms that will help our community um in the current environment thanks Stephen for joining today absolutely thank you all