Last week, five Democratic senators introduced
the Relief Act aimed at eliminating the visa backlog.
The bill is designed to reduce the backlog within five years
and prevent future backlogs by lifting per country caps.
If passed, it would also help to keep families together by preventing dependent
children who qualify for a green card from aging out when they turn 21.
Stay tuned because we are going to take a closer look at what's in the bill,
what it would mean for those waiting for a green card
and some of the criticism that the bill has received.
And if this is your first time on my channel, be sure to subscribe
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The Relief Act is headed by Senator Dick Durbin
and is an attempt to update the broken green card system,
which has not been revised in more than three decades.
Right now, there are roughly 9 million people stuck in the backlog,
including millions of individuals outside the country
waiting to reunite with their family members here in the US.
Currently, there are only 226,000 family-based green cards
and 140,000 employment-based green cards available each year.
On top of that, the law also imposes a per-country cap,
meaning the number of green cards available to immigrants from each country
cannot exceed 7% of the total number of visas issued each year.
This has created long wait times for people in countries with high demand
such as Mexico, China, India, and the Philippines.
So how would the Relief Act fix the green card backlog?
The goal of the bill is to eliminate the current backlog over the next
five years by processing all of the applications in the order they were filed.
If passed, it would also prevent
future backlogs by eliminating the per country caps for employment
based green cards and increase the per country caps for family-based
green cards to 15% of the total number issued each year.
The bill also has changes aimed at keeping families together,
such as reclassifying spouses and children of existing green card holders
as immediate relatives, making them exempt from annual limits;
exempting the spouses and children of employment
based petitions; and protecting children who qualify for a green card
based on their parent's application from aging out when they turn 21.
Senator Alex Padilla, one of the bill's five co-sponsors,
said: "For far too long, the backlog of green card applications has restricted
access to the American dream for millions of people.
This bill is a commonsense step toward eliminating the green card
backlog and providing relief for immigrant families."
If you are stuck in the backlog, leave me a comment to let me know how long
you have been waiting and how you think these changes would help.
While in theory, this bill would be a big win for those fighting
for immigration reform, the announcement last week did not receive a warm welcome.
Like all the proposed bills we have covered on this channel.
The Relief Act would need 60 votes to pass in the Senate, which is unlikely.
The lack of enthusiasm could also be because it is not the first time
this bill has been proposed.
In an article published about the bill, the author pointed out how within hours
of the Relief Act introduction in the Senate, backlog immigrants
took to Twitter to point out that the bill had been introduced before.
This is in reference to the fact that Senator Durbin has introduced bills
of the same name in 2019 and 2020,
both of which never gained enough support to move forward.
In addition to the millions of individuals stuck in the visa backlog,
there are also hundreds of thousands waiting for the National Visa Center
to schedule their interviews.
I will include a link to my video here covering the NVC's most recent update
on the interview backlog.
I will also continue
bringing you additional immigration news as it's available, so be sure to subscribe
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Click here to watch this video next and I'll see you there.