1. United States
2. Texas
3. Letter

A May 21 USCIS memo gutted the standard green card process for 1.2 million legal immigrants, including H-1B workers already employed by U.S. companies and spouses of American citizens. They are being told to self-deport and re-apply through consulates running 6 to 18 months behind. The Cato Institute’s David Bier said DHS has slashed green card approvals in half over the last year and called the memo a radical expansion of the administration’s quiet quitting on legal immigration. U.S. employers who hired and sponsored these workers now face losing them for over a year, or permanently, to labor markets in Canada and the UK that are actively recruiting the same talent. This memo oversteps what USCIS is legally allowed to do. Adjustment of status is a right Congress wrote into the Immigration and Nationality Act in 1952 and has expanded multiple times since. USCIS cannot override a federal statute through an internal memo, and attorneys nationwide are already preparing legal challenges. I am asking you to publicly oppose Policy Memorandum PM-602-0199, call for its immediate rescission, and direct your staff to join or support any legal challenge that protects the congressionally established rights of legal immigrants and the U.S. employers who depend on them.