Coronavirus Impact on Immigration

How the Coronavirus Is Impacting Immigration

Spread of the new coronavirus, COVID-19, has caused panic across the United States. With the number of confirmed cases on the rise, the coronavirus has started to affect several facets of immigration.

How government officials handle the virus could have a significant impact on people navigating our immigration process, their health, and the immigration system at large. Some government responses have already made an impact.

USCIS Office Closures Over Coronavirus

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) shut down its Seattle field office on Tuesday, March 3 due to concerns over the coronavirus. An employee of the USCIS office had visited a family member at the Life Care Center in Kirkland, Washington before it was confirmed the facility had an outbreak of the virus.

Other USCIS offices may close as the virus spreads across the United States. USCIS is tracking office closures on their website.

Those waiting outside the Seattle office last week were surprised to find it closed. One man, who had been ordered to leave the country for Mexico, couldn’t get to his passport—it was locked inside the office. Another man had been waiting for his biometrics appointment but would need to reschedule.

USCIS office closures can have a large impact on immigrants and their families. They often wait months or longer for their scheduled appointments. Rescheduling missed or cancelled appointments can result in further delays.

Immigration and Coronavirus

Immigration judges want to know how to handle coronavirus

The union representing immigration judges urged the Trump administration in a letter Monday to "immediately" implement steps to protect judges and their staff and provide guidance on how to proceed amid the coronavirus outbreak, which also has the potential to exacerbate the overwhelming backlog of pending cases.

The letter calls for the Executive Office for Immigration Review, an agency within the Justice Department that oversees the nation's immigration courts, to inform employees about the plan "as it relates to a potential pandemic," noting that some immigration court functions "may not lend themselves to telework."

"As you know, our work requires us to be in close contact with the public on a daily basis, often in very large numbers and groups," wrote Judge Ashley Tabaddor, president of the National Association of Immigration Judges.

She continued: "Beyond our own employees, the respondents who come before us may also be at high risk for developing serious illness. Because we order their appearance and they face the prospect of removal if they don't appear, sick respondents and respondents vulnerable to serious illness will keep coming to court unless we take action."

U.S. Citizenship for Children

Derivative Citizenship for Children of U.S. Citizens

U.S. Citizenship for Children Under INA Section 320

Child Citizenship Act

Adult permanent residents apply for U.S. citizenship by filing Form N-400, Application for Naturalization. But minor children (under age 18) may not use this form. Under Section 320 of the Immigration and Naturalization Act, also known as the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, children under 18 automatically acquire U.S. citizenship if the following three conditions have been fulfilled:

At least one of the child’s parents is a U.S. citizen by birth or naturalization;

The child is a permanent resident under 18 years of age;

The child is residing in or has resided in the United States in the legal and physical custody of the
U.S. citizen parent.

Once all three conditions are met at the same time, the child is a U.S. citizen by matter of law. The order of events makes no difference. If a child is a permanent resident and under 18, and then at least one parent naturalizes, the child automatically becomes a U.S. citizen. If a parent naturalizes and then the child gets permanent residence, the child becomes a U.S. citizen the moment he or she becomes a permanent resident, if that happens before the child is 18.

Greyhound will stop

Greyhound will stop allowing immigration checks on buses

Greyhound, the U.S.’s largest bus company, said on Friday that it will stop allowing Border Patrol agents without a warrant to board its buses to conduct routine immigration checks.

Greyhound Lines will no longer allow Border Patrol agents to conduct immigration checks on its buses without warrants, the company announced on Friday — one week after a leaked government memo revealed that agents could not board buses without consent.

The memo appeared to take Greyhound by surprise. For years, the company, the largest operator of intercity buses in America, had been allowing border agents to board its vehicles without warrants, citing a law that it said it didn’t agree with.

“C.B.P. searches have negatively impacted both our customers and our operations,” the company said in 2018, referring to Customs and Border Protection, the Border Patrol’s parent agency. “Greyhound does not coordinate with C.B.P., nor do we support these actions.”

But in the leaked memo, which was first reported by The Associated Press, the Border Patrol chief confirmed that agents were prohibited from boarding buses and questioning passengers without warrants or the company’s consent.

Immigration Restrictions

Immigration Restrictions Extend to Nearly 7% of the Entire World


The President issued the fourth travel ban of his presidency on Friday. This ban comes almost three years to the day after the first one brought thousands of protesters to airports around the country.

People from Nigeria, Eritrea, Myanmar, and Kyrgyzstan are now barred from immigrating to the United States. Those from Sudan and Tanzania will also be barred from the diversity visa program under the new ban. In total, people from 13 countries now face immigration restrictions based on where they were born.

Individuals from the newly affected countries will still be able to travel to the United States on other visas, such as student or tourist visas. But they cannot, however, become permanent U.S. residents.

Although the ban is supposedly based in national security, it only blocks those who had ties to the United States strong enough to permanently immigrate. This fact has long undermined the administration’s national security rationales.

This will have the greatest effect on U.S. citizens seeking to bring over family members, including spouses and children. Many Americans fear that they won’t be able to bring over adopted children under the new ban.

As with the last travel ban, some people can apply for waivers that would let them immigrate. But the current waiver process is often criticized as inadequate.

Voter Registration Error

Voter registration error risks deportation for immigrants

CHICAGO (AP) — The day Margarita Del Pilar Fitzpatrick applied for an Illinois driver's license upended her life. When a clerk offered to register her to vote in 2005, the Peruvian citizen mistakenly accepted, leading to long legal battles and eventually deportation.

A decade and a half later, she struggles to find work at 52, is nearly homeless and hasn't seen two of her three American citizen daughters in years because of a secretary of state's office mishap.
“It has derailed our lives,” she said in a phone interview from Lima. “Immigrants should not be put in this situation.”

A handful of other immigrants could face a similar fate, or criminal charges, after a mistake in Illinois' automatic voter registration system allowed of hundreds of people who identified themselves as non-U.S. citizens to register. Sixteen cast ballots.

The fiasco in a state with a reputation for election shenanigans triggered a partisan battle, infuriated voter advocacy groups and left immigrant rights activists doing damage control.
“It’s disappointing because the situation could have been avoided,” said Lawrence Benito, head of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.

Separations at the Border

Judge Allows Certain Family Separations at the Border to Continue

The Trump administration received an unfortunate victory in the case against their family separation policy.

On January 13, 2020, Federal Judge Dana Sabraw sided with the government in a lawsuit challenging continued separations at the border. Although the judge ordered an end to most family separations in 2018, he has allowed families to be separated under certain exceptions.

These exceptions have let the practice continue on a smaller—yet still devastating—scale. Over 1,000 children have been separated since the judge’s earlier ruling.

Under the administration’s “zero tolerance” policy, immigrant parents were systematically separated from their children at the U.S.-Mexico border and prosecuted for entering the United States without authorization. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a lawsuit shortly after the policy was announced in April 2018. Judge Sabraw ordered an end to the policy two months later. He also ordered the reunification of the over 2,800 families who had been separated under the policy.
He allowed, however, for separations when there is “a determination that the parent is unfit or presents a danger to the child.”

Since that 2018 decision, thousands of children have been separated. The government relies on different “exceptions” to continue the separations.

In some cases, the government cites the parent’s criminal history or health condition. In others, they have expressed doubts of a legitimate parent-child relationship. They allege criminal history—even if the offense took place years ago and was non-violent. It can be as simple as a traffic citation. In some cases, the parent has not been charged with a crime but is simply suspected of one by the U.S. government.