[ Ссылка ] Good News, the US Government is taking action to clear Fiance + Spouse Visa applicants who have been waiting on Consular Interviews. After 15 months of curtailment of consulate services, US immigration has about 500,000 cases on hold pending interviews. To address this issue, $5.6 billion dollars is budgeted by Department of State and $345 million is budgeted by USCIS for manpower and facilities to help clear the backlog.
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It has been a rough ride for the past 15 months for Fiance and Spouse visa applicants.
On March 18, 2020 in fear of the spread of Covid 19, US Embassies and Consulates around the world
locked their doors to the public, cancelling all scheduled visa interviews.
Some of my clients had even traveled long distances to attend their interviews, and without
receiving any warning from the Embassy arrived in time for their interviews only to find the gates to the consulate locked
and were turned away by the guards.
And very sadly some of these clients, who at that time were at their very end of their application process and had only the
interview remaining are still waiting even today.
Normally with a Fiance or Spouse visa case once it leaves USCIS it goes to the State Departments
offices in New Hampshire called the National Visa Center or NVC. The cases usually don't stay at NVC
for very long, before being forwarded overseas to the destination consulate for the interview.
Well due to Covid 19, instead of NVC being just a short layover for a case, NVC has become a warehouse.
Cases are being held, stockpiled at NVC awaiting good news from consulates advising that they have resumed normal operations
and are open to the public for interviews.
Some consulates reopened within a few months. some consulates still remain closed..
In February 2017 at the beginning of President Trumps presidency,
there were almost 3,000 cases in process, temporily on hold at NVC.
this February 2021, due to Covid 19's throttling down of consulate operations, there are now roughly100 times more, about 300,000 cases
on hold, warehoused at NVC.
So what can be done?
Well, good news. Plans are in the works to address the problem.
And this is the same problem and the same solution we have all experienced at our local grocery store.
You've done your shopping and you want to pay. Well the checkout line is long,
and it's taking forever to finish your transaction and get out of there. So what
does the store management do. Do they let customers leave without paying? No.
What they do is put another cashier on the till and open another checkout line.
US immigration is going to do the same thing. They are not going to let applicants
skip the interview, but what they are going to do is open up more facilities, and
hire more officers to conduct interviews and issue visas.
President Biden's current budget proposal is to grant the US state department
$5.4 Billion to hire 1,200 officer and expand facilities. Also added to the budget
is $345 million for USCIS to address their backlog as well.
So far already, the State Department has doubled up on interview availability in
Mexico, by now opening up the US embassy in Mexico City to also conduct visa
interviews in addition to the consulate in Juarez, which previously had be the
only location were immigrant visas were issued. I expect that this trend
will continue where additional secure locations are found to help add more
"check out lines" for visa interviews to take place.
This was Fred Wahl, The VisaCoach,
here to personally guide you on this journey.
