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Ice on Immigration: Religious worker visa delays

By L. Patricia Ice, Featured Columnist

Question:  I am a temporary professional religious worker for a well-known religious denomination.  In 2006, after three years, my R-1 visa status expired.  Before it expired, I filed an I-129 Petition for Nonimmigrant Worker to extend my R-1 status for two more years.  My wife filed an I-539 Application to Extend Status for herself and our children at the same time.  It has been 8 months and neither I nor my wife have gotten an approval of the extensions.  A lawyer prepared all of the paperwork and we have received receipts and requests for additional evidence to which we have responded and complied.  We know the applications and responses to the request for evidence were timely filed.  We would like to visit our native country next month, but according to the lawyer, we cannot leave until our extensions are approved.  Why is it taking so long?

Answer:  The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has reported seeing a tremendous increase in fraudulent temporary and permanent religious visa applications.  Therefore, the USCIS has decided to dedicate more adjudication time to each and every religious visa petition or application.  First, the USCIS suspended the I-907 Premium Processing program for religious visa petitions.  The USCIS also sent out standard requests for additional evidence to each religious visa petitioner, asking for a myriad of documents and other information about the petitioner and the beneficiary.  The USCIS now says that it may personally visit each religious petitioner and make other changes to the religious visa program.  As a matter of fact, the USCIS recently announced that it would make significant changes to the federal regulations affecting the special immigrant religious immigrant visa and the R-1 temporary visa categories.  The USCIS believes that the proposed rules will ensure the integrity of the religious worker program and, at the same time, streamline the process for legitimate petitioners.  Unfortunately, currently it is taking an unusually long time to adjudicate any religious visa request.  I advise you not to leave the United States until your visa status extension is approved.  If you leave, you may not legally be able to return to the United States for three or more years.  I suggest that you develop a lot of patience during this difficult period.  There is not much you can do to speed up the process.