Live Session- Adjustment of Status Dilemma

Added: 2026-06-01

[00:00:04]Good morning.

[00:00:07]Good morning. How are you? How you feeling?

[00:00:10]So, we want to talk about the adjustment of status drama that is going on.

[00:00:17]Uh we want to answer some questions.

[00:00:33]Good morning. Good morning. How are you?

[00:00:35]How you feeling? Let me know in the comments section.

[00:00:40]Uh let me know in the comments section.

[00:00:43]We're talking about the latest immigration news.

[00:00:47]Uh the adjustment of status uh drama.

[00:00:54]I tried to post it.

[00:01:01]Yeah, we're talking about the latest immigration news, the adjustment of status drama that is going on.

[00:01:08]Uh if you have concern, questions, I'm taking question.

[00:01:18]I know what you mean, Simba.

[00:01:22]I don't know what you mean.

[00:01:24]Uh good morning. How are you? How you doing?

[00:01:27]Good morning, Frederick.

[00:01:30]Uh Boam 4255.

[00:01:34]I'm doing good. How are you?

[00:01:37]Uh we're talking about the latest um adjustment of status drama that is going on with USCIS.

[00:01:47]This new policy memorandum. I want to really discuss it in depth so that we can uh all have a better understanding on what is really going on Um and how to better position ourselves.

[00:02:03]So, um How to better position ourselves?

[00:02:15]Um Good morning. Good morning. How are you?

[00:02:19]How are you feeling?

[00:02:21]Saba Julie's.

[00:02:23]So, adjustment of status is new policy memorandum, okay? I want to pull first of all, uh let's talk about adjustment of status application involving this question, okay? Who actually is concerned?

[00:02:40]Adjustment of status provision involving this question, who's concerned?

[00:02:44]Family-based and adjustment of status. Those are things like uh spouse of a US citizen, spouse of a lawful permanent resident, the one that is with a lawful status cuz remember lawful permanent resident is not immediate relative for the purpose of adjustment, okay? But anyway, um family-based type of adjustment, child of a US citizen, a child of a lawful permanent resident, um a parent of a US citizen, um type of adjustment, um special immigrant and base adjustment EB4, those are religious worker, uh diversity visa adjustment of status, that's lottery, that's a matter of discretion as well.

[00:03:38]Some employment-based adjustment, not all but some employment-based adjustment, uh trafficking victim-based adjustment, crime victim-based, that's like U visa, T visa, asylee, not refugee, asylee, asylee type of adjustment, Cuban adjustment, um Cuban Adjustment Act, um former Soviet Union and the nation Iranian parolee adjustment, diplomat or high-ranking official unable to return home type of adjustment is a matter of discretion, okay?

[00:04:21]But, when we talk about those type of crime-based adjustment, asylee asylee adjustment, uh trafficking victim-based adjustment, even though it's a matter of discretion, but remember if a person is a victim, that person being a victim in itself creates extraordinary circumstances under that type of person's circumstances, okay? They will have a better uh way to convince USCIS to exercise their favorable discretion, unless they have criminal uh record or something of that sort, cuz I believe that if you are uh traffic family-based adjustment or a a U visa type of recipient, uh even though it's a matter of discretion, you will be able to use a better argument than most people.

[00:05:15]That's what I believe.

[00:05:16]And quite frankly, I find it to be true as well.

[00:05:20]Um And let's see if we have questions before we keep going. Do we have question?

[00:05:27]Okay, we don't have question yet, but I'm just going to try to talk about it and then go from there.

[00:05:36]So, what else we have here?

[00:05:41]Okay. When determining whether a favorable exercise of discretion is warranted, What exactly are they looking at? Basically, you have to first meet the eligibility requirement for adjustment. What are What are those eligibility requirement for adjustment?

[00:06:00]Visa must be immediately available. You have to be a recipient of an immigrant visa.

[00:06:07]Visa must be immediately available. Must be admitted or inspected or parole.

[00:06:16]Then um not otherwise inadmissible.

[00:06:22]Then they can use a favorable discretion on your behalf. So, you really have to meet first of all the requirement for adjustment of status. First, how you enter the United States. Were you inspected or paroled, number one? Or if a bar apply under your circumstances like VAWA applicants, um or if you qualify under the 245i, then you meet that inspection admission requirement, okay?

[00:06:51]Then visa has to be immediately available at the time of adjustment.

[00:06:57]Um and then for lawful permanent resident, then you have must be within lawful status and visa has to be available as well at the time of adjustment.

[00:07:05]Um not You have to be a recipient on a of an approved petition, okay? The petition has to first be approved as well.

[00:07:15]Then last uh fourth number fourth, not otherwise inadmissible. Either based on criminal ground or anything else. Then they exercise favorable discretion. So, first you meet the eligibility requirement, then we look at discretion, okay?

[00:07:35]And what are the factors? Those Those are the thing we really want to talk about. What are the factors uh to consider? USCIS will consider in the in the totality of circumstances. They really have to look at your case and look at the entire case, okay?

[00:07:53]The first issue is eligibility requirement. If you meet the eligibility requirement, then we start looking at the factors. What are the discretionary factor, okay?

[00:08:06]Positive factor include family ties to the United States and the closeness of the the underlying relationship. Like a spouse of a US citizen, for example. This is family tie. And how close you are, how long you've been married, those are the things they're going to look at into.

[00:08:25]Hardship of to the applicant or close relative if the adjustment of application is denied. Hardship, okay? Is it financial hardship?

[00:08:37]Financial hardship, you can't really claim it because remember once you start claiming financial hardship, my problem becomes is the sponsor really eligible to sponsor you? Remember, you don't want to you especially when it comes to family uh type of adjustment, you don't want to use that argument. You have to be careful if you're using financial hardship argument because you're defeating yourself based on the fact that uh are you going to be a public charge? Now they're questioning, "Okay, if your argument's financial, are you a public charge now? Do we have to worry about you start taking uh government benefit? You know what I mean?"

[00:09:18]So, do we have to worry about you taking government benefit or what? Because now you're giving us an argument of financial hardship. It has to be some type of hardship beyond financial.

[00:09:30]That's my personal opinion. It has to be something about you know, some type of emotional hardship.

[00:09:37]emotional distress, uh mental anguish type of hardship when it comes to family base, to be honest, cuz if you just start looking at financial, then it's like, "Okay, first of all, then looks like your sponsor cannot really sponsor you."

[00:09:54]Uh they have to be able to take care of you financially when it comes to family base, okay?

[00:09:59]Um then they look into length of lawful residence in the United States. How long you've been here? More than 10 years, really, that's a good thing.

[00:10:09]Uh status held during that residency, how long you've been here, what type of status you had.

[00:10:17]Um especially if you For people like under DACA, for example, they came for very long time.

[00:10:25]Uh they were young. So, they can't We can't really attribute their unlawful presence to themselves because they were young. They can't make their own decision. They came because of their parents.

[00:10:37]Uh or they were uh not accompanied by their parents. So, their unlawful presence is kind of like arguable, you know what I mean? Like, really, I'm unlawful here, not because I want to be unlawful here. Basically, I was brought here as young person.

[00:10:54]Um how long have been you've been here?

[00:10:57]They They're going to look into it as well.

[00:11:00]Um especially for young people who The people who came here at the young age, they're going to be at a little bit of advantage when it comes to factors consider, okay?

[00:11:13]Then they look into immigration status and history. I talked about it. If you go to my last Instagram page, you'll see I talked about it.

[00:11:22]They wanted to look into compliance with immigration laws.

[00:11:26]Uh that's when B2, F1 visas, they look at intent, original intent. You came here, what was your original intent and now you're changing status.

[00:11:39]Uh they look at B2 visa, F1 visa, uh the B the um the temporary type of worker visa. Um those type of visas that you came with.

[00:11:50]They look at compliance. Did you comply with your immigration history? The main issue here will be unlawful presence because most people, you know, you over they overstayed their visa.

[00:12:01]Uh but you can balance that one out with something else, okay?

[00:12:06]And they can approve you based on humanitarian uh um based on humanitarian type of reasons, okay?

[00:12:19]Uh when it comes to humanitarian like that's when we go into a silly, um you know, T T visa, trafficking, human trafficking victim, of crimes, U visa type, humanitarian, based on humanitarian reasons, uh they can look into it and say, "Okay, we're going to approve it uh because of hardship."

[00:12:42]You know, those are the people who can bring financial hardship type of argument, humanitarian uh visa type, okay? Then they can look into those type of argument. And quite frankly, when it comes to a silly, U visa, T visa, unless you really have a criminal record, a questionable criminal record, a questionable is um immigration history, people who, let's say, they come, they were barred, they reentered again without inspection, uh that's something they can look into as negative, but in itself, humanitarian visa is basically an extraordinary circumstances, to be honest. That's just in itself, that's an argument in itself, okay?

[00:13:26]Uh then business, employment, and skills. They look into your skills. If you're a person who That's why they say those who can provide economic benefit are going to be Most of them will be exempt from this uh policy because they're able to provide economic [clears throat] benefit to the United States. Those are the people who invested like in property, um invested in um in creating jobs, uh they have the skills, the training relevant to uh the potential of And let's say nurses, for example, those are the people who work during uh the pandemic.

[00:14:08]Uh those are the the people who they're going to look at their employment skills and business skills, okay?

[00:14:17]Um community standing and moral character.

[00:14:21]For example, let's say a person That's one uh when it comes to background check as far as uh crimes are concerned. Those are the people who have a hard time.

[00:14:32]Remember this waivers are still available, but still even waivers are discretionary. The people who really have hard time with this adjustment of status are those who have criminal records, okay? Let's just be honest. Uh that would require a lot of um basically arguments and require a lot of um convincing, okay?

[00:14:57]Um respect for law. If you should you respect the law, that's fine. You don't have criminal record. Uh if you you work in the military or you have a family member in the military, that's a positive factor. You comply with tax law, you're filing your taxes, that's a positive factor.

[00:15:17]Um this too for married people, that's when it comes into married by filing separately. They're looking at as a bad moral character. Those are the things that if you don't get, you need to stop right now as far as if you're trying to adjust status of our for your citizenship, okay?

[00:15:35]Current or past cooperation with law enforcement.

[00:15:39]They're looking at community service beyond what the court will say.

[00:15:44]That's when I talk about a person can build their positive factors. The involvement in the community. What exactly are you doing for the community where you live? What exactly are you doing?

[00:16:00]What is your involvement in that community?

[00:16:04]Okay, as far as are you involved in the community? Do you volunteer somewhere for a good cause? How long have you been doing that? What exactly are you doing that is beneficial to the community because you really want to make sure that you are convincing USCIS because basically what USCIS saying is that you have to convince them that you married.

[00:16:24]You have married in it, okay?

[00:16:28]Yeah, so those are the things >> [clears throat] >> that they're going to be looking at.

[00:16:34]Um The positive factor must outweigh the negative factor.

[00:16:42]Um Yeah.

[00:16:54]So that's when they deny. If the negative factor outweigh the positive factor, they're just going to deny it.

[00:17:01]Um so that's basically what we have to take into consideration. Let me see first of all if we have questions then I can go move on to the um to the next doing well, thanks.

[00:17:15]So do we have questions about everything that I just said here about adjustment of status?

[00:17:21]Before I move on to the next news, do we have questions?

[00:17:30]Let me put this uh live session on >> [snorts and clears throat] >> Okay. So, do Oh, okay, you got it. So, I'm trying to see if I can post it on my uh before we move on to the next news, I want to uh post this one.

[00:19:15]Yeah, I need to post it uh on my IG.

[00:19:21]Okay?

[00:19:41]Yeah, I'll post it later. Let's see.

[00:19:44]Anybody uh Subi, do you have a question?

[00:19:47]Uh Subway Julie 644, do you have a question before we move on to the next news? Because the adjustment of status news is the main news. That's really what is breaking news as we are talking.

[00:20:01]This is the breaking news, but if you want to move on to the next news, um we can move on to the next news, but uh if you have question about this one, let me know so we can talk about it.

[00:20:19]Um yeah, adjustment of status is the main news, to be honest. Uh but let's see if there's another thing going on.

[00:20:28]Okay, airports. If you're traveling outside of the United States, I'm going to share this one.

[00:20:34]Uh Okay, let me share the the the other screen for this one, okay?

[00:21:13]I'm really from the Congo. I'm doing a 730 petition. It's my family petition.

[00:21:17]I'm so concerned.

[00:21:20]730 petition is not adjustment of status. That's just a reunification based on you being a society.

[00:21:29]We're talking about when it's time to apply for a green card, that's when you start looking at this new policy. That's when you will be concerned, okay?

[00:21:39]That's when you have to convince USCIS that you married to get the green card.

[00:21:46]But when it comes to 730 petition because you you won asylum, then you can reunite with your family. That's a different story. We're talking about when it's time to apply for the green card.

[00:22:00]How am I supposed to position myself in a way that I convince USCIS that I in fact married asylum Sorry, married green card.

[00:22:12]I deserve it, basically. The deservability of it. So, that's when you have to convince USCIS. But that one is totally fine. You just apply and wait. I don't know what is the waiting time at this moment, especially with all this Ebola going on. I want to share my screen. Let me share my screen for this one.

[00:22:32]And see Sorry. [clears throat] Share Okay, sorry.

[00:22:38]Let me share the screen.

[00:22:40]Okay.

[00:22:41]Share the screen so we can talk about um >> [snorts] [snorts] >> Okay, who's this one I'm showing?

[00:23:24]Okay, so now let's talk about um Okay.

[00:23:42]Okay, so we're talking about um this one, okay, this document. Because of the Ebola that is going on, um there's there are some restriction, updated airport arrival restriction, um to flights carrying person who have recently traveled from or were otherwise present within the Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC, Uganda, and South Sudan, okay?

[00:24:13]So, I'm from the DRC. Um then they're talking about uh Uganda and South Sudan. If you came from that those places, um what you're going to have to be under quarantine, okay? US citizen and US national, if they have departed from or were otherwise present in those place, um during the 21 days prior to their travel to the United States, what are they going to be doing? First of all, uh Yeah, all flights carrying those US citizen, US or pre-approved accepted alien with nexus to this country uh the 21 days prior to travel will be required to arrive at the airport designated. You have to come to those airport. Dallas International Jacksonville Huntsville Jackson Atlanta George Bush into into into intercontinental airport at Houston Jeff Kennedy. Those are the airport that you have to come through.

[00:25:22]And quite frankly Yes. So that's because of the Ebola.

[00:25:28]And I feel like if you And they're going to put people into quarantine.

[00:25:36]Yeah.

[00:25:40]Yeah, what else we have here?

[00:25:46]Title 42, okay?

[00:25:49]Yes, because of uh Yeah, because of this disease lawful permanent resident will be subject to title 42 order, okay? What exactly it means?

[00:26:04]Traveler They're suspending entry for lawful permanent resident under the title 42 order bearing traveler who have been in the DRC, Uganda, South Sudan in the last 21 days. Okay? If you are a lawful permanent resident and you go to those country, you will not enter the United States based on title 42, which prevent the entry of certain national based on contagious diseases. Remember this title 42 during COVID, it was really used because they just didn't want people to get to the US.

[00:26:45]So the same title 42 is being used now.

[00:26:51]The same title 42 is being used now in terms of um Yeah, in terms of what exactly you supposed to do.

[00:27:10]As far as the disease is concerned, if you're a US citizen, you have to come through those four airports. That's it.

[00:27:17]Come back through those four airports.

[00:27:19]If a lawful permanent resident, you're barred from entering the United States.

[00:27:22]And what's going to happen if the bar prolonged to 6 months, then uh you're going to have to apply for re-entry permit or the waiver the green card is going to be deemed abandoned.

[00:27:35]So, that's going to be challenging for lawful permanent resident.

[00:27:40]So, I am like yeah.

[00:27:50]Yeah, so what else?

[00:28:08]Except the uh the the the national the US citizen is going to come through those four airports.

[00:28:15]Actually, three.

[00:28:17]Three airports uh and the one that went on basically, they were working there based on the US government interest, then they still going to come back.

[00:28:30]Um but still through those airports, okay?

[00:28:34]But lawful permanent resident, if you went like for vacation on your own for on your own there is a bar from re-entering.

[00:28:44]Yeah, that's uh not a news.

[00:28:54]Uh asylum fees mandatory and a force failed to pay within 30 days of the notice.

[00:29:03]Um You have to pay, okay?

[00:29:16]You have to pay for the 100 annual fees if your asylum is still pending.

[00:29:22]Don't rely on USCIS to send the notice.

[00:29:25]Sometimes they might forget. Just, you know, just pay.

[00:29:30]Okay.

[00:29:32]So, what else we have here is a question. It says, "As an approval applicant waiting for I-140, should I be worried?"

[00:29:41]Well, if they need information, you have to uh if they need more information in order to make um because the I-45 is is already pending, right? So, now if they need more information as far as um meeting the discretionary uh exceptional circumstances factor, then you have to respond. So, should should you be concerned? Just a little bit. You should be concerned. Why?

[00:30:09]Because um family-based type of application are part of the um the um discretionary uh type of uh measure. So, uh what exactly can you do while you're waiting? You can start building if if you don't have anything that shows because VAWA in itself, because you're a victim, VAWA in itself shows that extraordinary circumstances warranted, right? But anyway, if they want more, then you can build it. You can build um evidence in terms of to show extreme um hardship to yourself because now you don't have the spouse or whatever you were basing your vowel on. So, uh you have to build those type of evidence that to show extreme hardship. But, um you just have to wait and see if they're going to ask for it. But, you just have to be aware in terms of if they ask for it, what type of evidence they might supposed to to show in terms of that. So, Yeah, transfer is not the problem because they always transfer to Vermont.

[00:31:25]Um so, yeah, transfer is not a problem.

[00:31:27]They transfer cases based on the fact that if that center do not have a lot of application, they want to transfer there so that it can go faster.

[00:31:38]So, transferring an application is not a problem. It happen all the time.

[00:31:44]Happens all the time, okay?

[00:31:47]I shouldn't be concerned just because something has been transferred now.

[00:31:52]I won't be concerned about it.

[00:32:13]Yeah. So, What else we have here?

[00:32:25]I guess this is it for today, right?

[00:32:27]This is it for today.

[00:32:29]We pretty much cover everything we're supposed to cover in this video. Uh if you need a consultation, this This the time to do it. Concerned, worried, you need to talk to somebody about your specific circumstances, how to handle it, you have to schedule consultation, okay? All my consultation links are in my bio.

[00:32:53]Description box below.

[00:32:55]Till next time, bye-bye.