Discussion with USCIS Counsel, Re: I-485 Delay Litigation (ImmigrationPortal.Com, et al. v. Tom Ridge, et al.)
2/5/2004
Yesterday, Attorney William Erb from the Office of Litigation, US department of Justice called me. He is authorized to speak for all the defendants in this matter. We discussed a number of issues.
He informed me that a summary of this lawsuit had been sent to several members of Congress. He mentioned that reduction of backlogs was a common sense prerequisite to immigration reform currently being considered by the White House and by Congress. We agreed that if Congress passes laws addressing the backlog issue, our lawsuit could become moot.
I suggested that we meet with USCIS to discuss immediate remedial measures that would help ameliorate problems without massive overhaul in the statutory or regulatory framework. I am not at all confident that we can work something out, but it is worth a try. Typical examples of problems that can be removed without much ado are:
Elimination of repeat EAD, Advance Parole and Fingerprinting; counting the I-485 portability from the I-485/I-140 filing rather than from the I-140 approval, etc.
So people, get together and draft a bunch of suggestions that I can present to the defendants. They might agree to meet with me after reviewing our proposal.
Regards to all. Rajiv.
PS Those who are not members of ImmigrationPortal.Com, can send me an email with their thoughts.
2/5/2004
Yesterday, Attorney William Erb from the Office of Litigation, US department of Justice called me. He is authorized to speak for all the defendants in this matter. We discussed a number of issues.
He informed me that a summary of this lawsuit had been sent to several members of Congress. He mentioned that reduction of backlogs was a common sense prerequisite to immigration reform currently being considered by the White House and by Congress. We agreed that if Congress passes laws addressing the backlog issue, our lawsuit could become moot.
I suggested that we meet with USCIS to discuss immediate remedial measures that would help ameliorate problems without massive overhaul in the statutory or regulatory framework. I am not at all confident that we can work something out, but it is worth a try. Typical examples of problems that can be removed without much ado are:
Elimination of repeat EAD, Advance Parole and Fingerprinting; counting the I-485 portability from the I-485/I-140 filing rather than from the I-140 approval, etc.
So people, get together and draft a bunch of suggestions that I can present to the defendants. They might agree to meet with me after reviewing our proposal.
Regards to all. Rajiv.
PS Those who are not members of ImmigrationPortal.Com, can send me an email with their thoughts.