Green card policy reversal. Foreigners in the US must now leave and apply from their home country. A surprise change to longstanding immigration process.

[Sinead_47]

The Trump administration announced on Friday May 23 that foreigners currently in the United States who wish to obtain a green card must now leave the country and apply from their home nation, reversing a longstanding policy that allowed adjustment of status from within the US.

The change affects hundreds of thousands of people who have been in the US legally on various visas and had been planning to adjust their immigration status without leaving. The announcement was described as a surprise even to immigration lawyers who follow policy closely.

Worldwww.npr.org

[Undertaker92]

The adjustment of status from within the US process has been in place for decades and the legal infrastructure around it is enormous. Courts will immediately challenge this

[Warden]

The practical impact falls hardest on people who have been in the US legally for years, paid taxes, built lives, and now face the disruption of having to leave a country they effectively live in to apply to live in it

[IronFist66]

The bars on re-entry that can trigger when someone leaves the US and then attempts to return make this especially complicated. Depending on someone's specific status history, leaving to apply from abroad could trigger a multi-year bar

[GhostRider89]

Immigration lawyers are the immediate winners of this announcement. The complexity created requires professional guidance that most affected people can barely afford

[IvoryOttie]

The tech industry has an enormous number of employees on adjustment of status pathways. The H-1B to green card pipeline runs through exactly the process that was just disrupted

[JayJ]

Congressional Republicans leaving for recess without passing the immigration enforcement bill this week and this policy reversal happening simultaneously suggests the administration is moving through executive action what it could not pass legislatively

[Oscar73]

The announcement being described as a surprise even to immigration specialists suggests the policy was not developed through the normal interagency process that produces legally durable rules

[BretHart_Mike]

The World Cup starting in three weeks with enormous numbers of international visitors creates a very specific tension with aggressive immigration enforcement as the backdrop