Declaratory Relief Action filed in court for retention of priority under CSPA

We just filed a declaratory action in federal district court for the northern district of California in San Francisco. Our action seeks to compel the USCIS to accord the old priority date for the newly filed I-130 by our client, who immigrated to the US several weeks ago on a visa petition filed by his sister in 1991. His son aged out under the Child Status Protection Act of 2002(CSPA). Without the old priority date, his son would have to wait for about 9 years before he can immigrant to the United States.

Under section 3(h)(3) of CSPA, our client can use the original priority date for his son in his new I-130 petition. Unfortunately, USCIS has not issued policy memo or promulgated any regulations on this law. As a result, USCIS has refused to apply this law to later filed I-130s.

We think without court intervention, USCIS will not on its own to accord the original priority date to our client.

We will keep everyone posted as to the status of this case.

On a separate note, our first mandamus action in CIS' failure to schedule interviews in a Natz case has a positive result: less than one month after the judge denied CIS and FBI motion to dismiss, our client has received interview notice(which means name check has been cleared).