Increase in immigration application fees

The sudden arrival of the global Coronavirus pandemic took governments around the world by surprise and definitely affected multiple sectors of the US society.

One of the sectors most affected by the health crisis is the immigration sector, which was paused almost completely for more than two months.

However, now that services are gradually returning to normal, we can still witness the aftermath of the massive COVID-19 outbreak.

For instance, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), which is the entity in charge of responding to immigration applications nationwide, had to close its offices and cancel face-to-face services to the public for more than two months.

Thus, because this federal agency’s income is almost entirely dependent on immigration application fees, it suffered a devastating downturn in revenue that threatened the entire immigration system of the country.

In fact, the USCIS planned to suspend 70% of its employees by the end of August, but the resumption of immigration services resulted in positive revenue for the entity.

Nowadays, the USCIS does not plan to suspend such a large portion of its employees, but it did announce a substantial increase in most immigration applications as of October 2, 2020, including naturalization ceremonies.

Motion Law keeps you up to date with the latest immigration news.

Increasing the fee for naturalization ceremonies

Naturalization ceremonies are the last step for immigrants to permanently become US citizens and hold an American passport.

The USCIS sponsors these ceremonies, which also initially receives the applications for a thorough review before approving them.

Within the USCIS fee increase, the application for naturalization ceremonies increased from $725 to $1,200, which represents a 60% increase.

As expected, due to the substantial increase in immigration applications, dozens of activists and immigrant rights advocates do not agree with this increase, mainly because there are immigrants who contribute greatly to the socioeconomic development of the country, but have low income and cannot afford the new price of naturalization ceremonies, but they deserve to become US citizens.

Do you need to file an immigration application? Contact Motion Law and follow the advice of experts.

Boston supports lawsuit

A non-profit organization recently filed a lawsuit against the increase in application fees for Naturalization Ceremonies.

Boston decided to support the lawsuit and recently filed an amicus brief (also known as legal complaint support) on behalf of 34 cities, counties and municipal agencies, calling to revoke the increase in fees for naturalization ceremonies.

In the legal document, the parties involved state: “The rule of the Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) challenged by Plaintiff in this action will radically increase the fee for naturalization applications, while at the same time making it all but impossible for most low-income applicants to seek a waiver or reduction of fees. In essence, the challenged rule seeks to impose a wealth test on naturalization.”

For now, neither the DHS nor the USCIS have given an official response to the lawsuit, nor to the amicus curiae filed by Boston.

Do you need help with an immigration case?

If you have any questions about an immigration issue or relating to a case you may have currently in progress, then please don’t hesitate to contact us for a FREE Phone Consultation with one of our expert immigration attorneys.

Simply call Motion Law today at: (202) 918-1799.