Hi, everybody.
In this video, we'll talk about a controversial topic.
Lots of questions we’re getting every day, public charge rule, what it is, and who will
be affected by this regulation that came out January 27, 2020.
But before we dive into the video, those of you who are here for the first time, I encourage
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So in this video, we'll talk about public charge general overview.
And in future videos, I’ll break it down based on the different categories that this
rule has in effect.
We also know about new forms that are going to be used when you file Adjustment of Status
cases, following the rule, and a lot of other updates that you need to know.
So, first things first, this rule is going to go into effect on the 24th of February
2020.
Any petitions that are filed before that are not subject to the rules.
So, if you're watching this before February 24th, you need to file your Adjustment of
Status applications, green card applications as soon as possible so you're not subject
to the rule.
So, what happens after February 24th?
So, in determining what is a public charge, the new regulations are actually shifting
the responsibility from the US citizen, the petitioner, where until this rule, when you
file for an Adjustment of Status, you need to make sure that the US citizen, the petitioner,
has sufficient income to sponsor an immigrant and by the way, they were doing that, to this
day, is looking at the petitioner’s income, tax returns, and all the good stuff.
But now, under the new rule, they're going to be shifting a lot of the responsibility
to the applicant.
And they're going to be looking at factors such as age, health, educational level, financial
status, and things like that, which are really, really interesting because that's going to
open the door to a lot more discretion, and a lot more power for the government to decide
who is likely to become a public charge.
It, also, will make it very difficult for people that are coming from low-income families
or people that really are struggling financially to qualify because if you think about it,
those factors like age, health, family status, income, education are trying to classify a
particular kind of people that will be more or less desired to immigrate to the United
States.
The rule is also focusing on people who are likely to become dependent on nine of the
government-sponsored programs, they added at least five new programs to people who are
maybe using those programs over a period of 12 months, in the aggregate, within 36 months,
which is three years of using at least 12 times of those benefits, which is very, very
limiting, and may essentially eliminate a lot of people from applying for green cards
in the near future.
The final regulations also added at least five new programs where people who use them
will be considered likely to become a public charge.
Some of these programs are section eight, certainly Medicaid, and Snap food programs
that were before not considered to be a public charge.
So, that's also something that was expanded and will create a much larger pool of people
who are not going to qualify based on these new regulations.
And finally, these regulations are creating a system where USCIS may impose a bond on
somebody who may not qualify under these regulations.
And unless they post the bond, they're not going to be able to qualify.
So all in all, as you can see, there's quite a lot of changes and a lot of limitations
that can really create a lot of hardship for people that typically are trying to get their
green cards based on family reunification.
We talked about a test of who is likely to become a public charge.
We talked about shifting this from the US petitioner to the applicant based on age,
family status, health status, economical status, and education, things that were never considered
before, essentially trying to narrow the pool of people who qualify.
It also creates more programs that people are using are going to be excluded from this.
And finally, a close for a bond, for people to post bond for those that the government
will think are not going to qualify under this rule.
So, this is kind of like in general, what the new regulations are going to be, they're
also going to be creating a new Form I-944 that will be used for purposes of filing an
adjustment, in addition to the regular force that we know right now.
So, we'll create separate videos on each one of these categories.
But in this video, we just wanted to kind of summarize what we know about the rule,
what is going to be effective.
And if you have any questions, make sure you post them below, and don't forget to subscribe
to our channel.
And in the next videos, we're going to break down further that rule.
Thanks for watching, and we'll see you in our next video.