Benders Immigration Bulletin has posted a really great mandamus decision by a federal district court judge in Houston ordering USCIS to adjudicate a naturalization case that has been delayed for nearly four years. Dan K. provides the money quote from Judge Rosenthal on the BIB page, but it's worth repeating:
This court orders as follows:
Within 14 days, the USCIS must order the FBI to expedite the name check on Abusadeh.
Within 60 days from the date the FBI completes the name check and reports the results to the USCIS, or by April 2, 2008, whichever is earlier, the USCIS must report to this court, in writing, as to whether the FBI has completed the name check on Abusadeh and reported the results to the USCIS. If not, the USCIS must report on the status of the name check and the reasons for the failure to complete it.
Within 30 days of receiving the report of the results of the name check from the FBI, the USCIS must decide Abusadeh's naturalization application.
If the decision is to grant the application, the USCIS must permit Abusadeh to be naturalized as a citizen within 30 days.
We are all somehow related to American citizens! We are either a parent or spouse of American citizens! and they are suffering!
How does your kid feel if they see you depressed everyday? If you cannot get promotion, change you job or have to live miles away from your spouse because you are in a limbo, what do you think its impact would be on your kids/spouse? How do you feel if your son/daughter can not see his/her grandparents for years because you can not travel?
If anyone thinks that this is only immigrants' problems, they are dead wrong. What do you think the impact of this issue would be on general public? Can a scientist/engineer/physician/worker who feels depressed, unstable and anxious fulfill his/her potentials and maximize his/her productivity?
Is this consistent with American values? Where are true American values? ... Give me your tired, your poor!
I am just hoping someone in department of Justice, USCIS or FBI consider the impact of these long delays and discrimination on American citizen lives and help resolve this issue.
God Bless America.
Posted by: Discrimination Galore! | January 08, 2008 at 08:03 PM
We are all somehow related to American citizens! We are either a parent or spouse of American citizens! and they are suffering!
How does your kid feel if they see you depressed everyday? If you cannot get promotion, change you job or have to live miles away from your spouse because you are in a limbo, what do you think its impact would be on your kids/spouse? How do you feel if your son/daughter can not see his/her grandparents for years because you can not travel?
If anyone thinks that this is only immigrants' problems, they are dead wrong. What do you think the impact of this issue would be on general public? Can a scientist/engineer/physician/worker who feels depressed, unstable and anxious fulfill his/her potentials and maximize his/her productivity?
Is this consistent with American values? Where are true American values? ... Give me your tired, your poor!
I am just hoping someone in department of Justice, USCIS or FBI consider the impact of these long delays and discrimination on American citizen lives and help resolve this issue.
God Bless America.
Posted by: Discrimination Galore! | January 08, 2008 at 08:02 PM
This was discussed before and the conclusion (based on a Supreme Court decision) was that discrimination in immigration law is allowed as folks being discriminated against are non-citizens. You would have a case only if the discrimination against non-citizens was shown to impact citizens in some way.
Posted by: LegalOption | December 30, 2007 at 03:06 PM
I am wondering if department of justice, which FBI is part of it, is aware of such a widespread discrimination against some people only based on the name! According to FBI and USCIS, people are guilty unless proven otherwise! So if your name is mohamed and someone with your name but 30 years younger or older, living 10000 miles outside of the US, talking different language has done something wrong, then you are discriminated and deprived from everything for years and years till you are able to prove that you are not the person they are looking for. It doesn't matter whether you are a scientist, engineer or physician who has entered this country legally, working and paying taxes and have never had any problems with the law and don't even have a traffic ticket!
Direct discrimination involves treating someone less favorably because of their possession of an attribute (e.g., sex, age, race, religion, family status, national origin, military status, disability), compared with someone without that attribute in the same circumstances(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination).
How about the most basic involuntary attribute of a person, which is his/her name?
The sad part is that, name check has nothing to do with national security. These people have been living in this country for years. The situation is much worse for people who are waiting for adjustment of status because they are in a limbo status and have to pay/renew their documents every year, can not travel, get promotions, etc.
God Bless America!
Posted by: Discrimination Galore! | December 30, 2007 at 02:53 PM
This kind of wording is quite typical, I think, so I am not sure why this case is so great. April 2 is far away, and I think it would be far better outcome if the judge just ordered to adjudicate the petition within 60 days, which is another wording that is often used. As written, Mr Abusadeh may have to wait 4 months before becoming a citizen. I think, this is a long wait.
I never undertood why the judges are so linient on FBI. I mean name check delays have been around for several years now. There is an obvious solution to the problem: hire and train many more FBI analysts to handle those more complex cases, and raise the fees accordingly. Name check is a fee-based service which FBI does for various agences including USCIS, so they just have to raise the fees to handle the workload. Why are they sitting on this problem and doing nothing is anybodys guess. My personal take is that they like us where we are, paying for AP and EAD and keeping low.
Posted by: hmm | December 29, 2007 at 07:25 PM