Back in February, I wrote about the complexity of immigration law, and described how a federal court conflated immigration provisions in an important case. Now it turns out that immigration law stumps even the Supreme Court. The Court’s recent decision in Scialabba v. Cuellar de Osorio is marred by errors that may well have affected its outcome.
Cuellar dealt with the typical stuff of family-based immigrant visa petitions. A family member files a visa petition to request that the government recognize a relationship that allows a relative to apply for a green card. Depending on factors like the type of family relationship and the relative’s age, the waiting time between filing a visa petition and a green card application can range from months to decades. Why the potentially long wait? Because the government caps the number of people who may immigrate each year in certain family petition categories.
A U.S. citizen’s child, for example, immediately qualifies to file for a green card when her parent submits a visa petition. There is no cap, and thus no wait. In contrast, because the demand for sibling visas far exceeds supply, a U.S. citizen’s sister might wait two decades after a petition is filed before she becomes eligible to apply for a green card.
To read the rest: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/laura-murraytjan/raise-your-hand-if-you-un_b_5531338.html