Hello, everybody. In this video, I'm going to cover some interesting changes that happened in
the past few weeks that may be of interest to you. First, we're going to talk about Biden's new plan
to make the citizenship process more accessible, and available to many, many more people. We're
going to talk about what happened so far, and the plan for the future. Next, we're going to
talk about some big changes that are coming to the US passport system. They're going to add another
gender option on passports for applicants who are gender non-conforming. We're gonna
talk about those changes, when they're coming, and what it's going to look like for future US
passports. And finally, we're going to talk about a new bill that was just introduced last week,
America's Children's Act. This is a bill that is going to help children that entered here legally
but somehow overstayed is going to help them solve their legal status and avoid deportation.
So lots of good stuff to talk about. What are you waiting for? I'll see you on the other side.
Hello everybody, and welcome back to our immigration channel. This is a place where you get
the most up-to-date immigration news, immigration information, and everything else that you need
to make your immigration less stressful. My name is Jacob Sapochnick, and I'm an immigration
attorney located in San Diego, California. And we help clients in all 50 states. In this video, we
have so many important topics to share with you. So let's get started right away. Let's talk about
the citizenship process. The Biden administration is launching a nationwide campaign to encourage
longtime residents green card holders to apply for citizenship. It is estimated that there are
9 million green card holders that are holding green cards for more than 10 years that still
have not applied for US citizenship. So now the administration is trying to find them
and encourage them to apply for citizenship. This campaign was launched just a few days ago, in
Biden's address to new citizens, those applicants were sworn in to become US citizens just before
July 4. So, let's see what Biden had to say to the new citizens in support of this new initiative.
I want to thank you all for choosing us. I mean it necessarily. Thank you for choosing
the United States of America, believing that America is worthy of your aspirations.
Whether your dreams making this journey you’ve done more than moved to a new place.
It's important to know that this effort is going to focus on the State Department
on the USCIS and also members of the military that are going to be getting a lot of incentives
to become US citizens for those that are not yet US citizens. This is essentially an interagency
plan to promote citizenship. Let's take a look at a few of the things that the Biden administration
already implemented since he introduced his executive order restoring faith in our
immigration system. They restored back the 2008 civics test, including changes of the guidance
to the kind of questions they're going to be asking at this test. As you know,
under the Trump administration, they've changed the test, made it more complicated, with more
questions, and some very controversial questions in that test. Now, that's all gone under Biden's
new policies. In late May 2021, there was a big policy change by USCIS allowing people who are
outside the United States to engage in religious duties to preserve their physical presence
for authorization purposes. As you know, if you spend time outside the United States, it may be
a problem for you to apply for citizenship, because you're not going to meet the physical
presence requirements. Well, those rules were changed specifically for that group of people,
encouraging them also to apply for citizenship when they returned to the United States. Also,
at the same time, in May of 2021, there's a new policy allowing veterans of the United
States armed forces who are residing overseas to apply for US citizenship, even if they currently
reside abroad. Again, this is a huge expansion of the policy that was not available before.
Also in early June, the government announced a $10 million fund to help people prepare for
citizenship applications all over the country. This is again, part of that push to encourage
more people to become US citizens. Also, another new policy that was launched a few months ago,
allowed USCIS to conduct video interviews specifically for naturalization cases. This
is something that was never seen before in any government agency. And we encourage the State
Department to follow the same path and start interviewing people overseas to get their visas
via video conferencing, just like USCIS. That's been a huge push that allowed USCIS to process
more than 180,000 citizen applications between the months of April and May of 2021. Let's see how far
this plan is going to go. We do know that there's no intention to reduce the fees anytime soon
or reduce the processing times of citizenship cases from the time of filing until the time
of interview. Once we have more information, we promise to update you right here on this channel.
Now let's jump to our next topic. Big, big changes to the US passport system. The State Department
announced just this week that they're going to be adding another gender option to all US
passports. This is specifically for applicants who are intersex and gender non-conforming,
instead of government announced that applicants can now choose their own gender marker between
male and female. That also means that transgender applicants will no longer need to provide
medical certifications. If their gender doesn't match what it says on their birth
certificates. This is a bigger push towards a better treatment of the LGBTQI community,
and US citizens regardless of gender or sex. This is really important because when you're
traveling with a gender marker on your ID, that doesn't currently match your gender presentation,
that puts a lot more risk of harassment, and discrimination. And hopefully, these changes are
going to prevent all this from happening moving forward. The State Department hasn't announced yet
when travelers can start choosing the additional gender marker. However, as of today, individuals
can start self-selecting males or females on their passports. Before we're gonna talk about
America's Children's Act. If you get here for the first time, make sure to subscribe to our channel,
click the notification bell, so you don't miss any of our videos. And also give us a big like,
so YouTube will be able to show this video to more people just like you. What is America's Children
Act? This bill is specifically focused on those young kids who moved to the United States legally
with visas, they could have H4 visas depending on the parent’s F2 visas. And over the years,
they overstayed their status. And now they're in limbo. This bill is going to help get them their
legal permanent residency, eventually. And this is how it's going to work. Number one new path
for citizenship for documented dreamers. Those are the kids that moved here as dependents of E visas,
L visas, H visas, J visas, F visas, they came here, they overstayed for whatever reason.
And now they're here in the United States in limbo. As long as they graduated from college,
and they've been in dependent status for at least 4 years, they're going to be able to apply for a
green card once that bill is going to pass. Number two, it's going to add the concept of aging out
for green card eligibility. As you know right now, children who are reaching the age of 21,
if their parents are not able to secure their Immigrant Visas on time, those children are aged
out and will have to get green cards on their own, resulting in devastating family separation. Well,
this bill is going to change all that. And here's how it's going to do it. This will require the
government to use the age of the child on the date when the green card for the parents was
filed by the employer, whether it's the I-140, or the labor certification, depending on which one
was first. So for example, if the child was 16, on the date with the labor certification was filed,
the child will stay 16 forever until the green cards are approved. Even on the date of approval,
the child is already over 21. This is going to eliminate the concept of aging out. Next,
It would authorize employment authorization for children that are stuck in the backlog. Right now
if your child has an E2 or an L1 applicant, you're not able to work, only a spouse can work. Well,
that's going to add eligibility for children who may want to go to work to help their families.
They have the ages of 16, 17, 18. They can go to work as long as their cases are still pending.
And they are subject to their parents' petitions. And finally, the bill will retain priority dates
for age-out children, it's going to help age-out children to claim their place in line
and obviously will allow families to stay together. So this is a huge bill. A very important
bill and we hope to see it moving forward in the next few months. So once we have our information,
we promised to update you. If you have any questions or concerns about anything that
you've seen in this video, please drop them in the comments below and I will answer them.
If you need help with your specific case. You can text me right here at 619-483-4549
and set up your consultation today. Thanks for watching, and we'll see you in our next video.