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How to Get Automatic Citizenship for Child ?

child

What is automatic citizenship? Automatic citizenship refers to the process by which certain children can acquire citizenship through their parents, but not at birth. Instead, a series of events occur that cause the child to become a U.S. citizen by operation of law. In fact, it is not unusual for a person to acquire U.S.…

The Child Status Protection Act

The U.S. Supreme Court has issued a decision significantly affecting the interpretation of the Act; please see my blog post on this decision for more details. The “Age Out” Problem The Child Status Protection Act (CSPA) is primarily intended to address the “age out” problem resulting from the Immigration and Nationality Act’s definition of a…

Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) – Renewal Process Announced

Today, the Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Jeh Johnson announced the much-anticipated renewal process for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. The process is effective immediately, which is important, because the first batch of DACA recipients will have their statuses expire in September of 2014. More details on the renewal process, and…

How to Read Visa Bulletin ?

What is the Visa Bulletin? Published each month, the Department of State’s visa bulletin announces the estimated waiting times for certain family and employment-based visa petitions. In other words, the visa bulletin will tell you how long the waiting line is for certain immigrant-visa categories and allow you to determine approximately where in line a…

Update on Stateside Waivers: Criminal Issues

On January 24, 2014, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) issued a new policy memorandum on stateside provisional (a.k.a. I-601A) waivers. This new guidance applies in cases where the applicant has a minor, criminal history. Previously, almost any significant criminal record would lead to a near automatic denial. Under the new policy announcement, however, certain…