USCIS Will Require Most Nonimmigrants to Leave U.S. to Seek Green Card

Overview

• USCIS issued a memorandum on Friday that generally bars adjustment of status inside the United States and directs most temporary nonimmigrants to return to their home countries to apply for a green card unless they can show extraordinary circumstances.
• The agency says routing cases to U.S. consulates will let it concentrate limited staff on priority work such as visas for victims of violent crime and trafficking and naturalization processing.
• Immigrant advocates and lawyers say the policy will put vulnerable people at risk, citing trafficking survivors, refugee children, Afghans and Ukrainians who may have no safe return and who, advocates say, will seek immediate court challenges.
• Practically, the change can force applicants to give up legal U.S. status and risk triggering three‑year, ten‑year or permanent re‑entry bars, while consular officers gain expanded discretion including possible public‑charge and social‑media reviews.
• The policy arrives during an intensified enforcement period that included large visa revocations and high ICE detention numbers and could reshape how family‑ and employer‑based green‑card cases are processed while prompting litigation over its legality.