DEPARTMENT OF STATE TO IMPLEMENT PUBLIC CHARGE RULE

After a Supreme Court ruling issued on February 21, 2020, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services ("USCIS") plans to implement the public charge rule nationwide. The USCIS will only apply the final rule to applications and petitions submitted on or after February 24, 2020.

On the same date, the Department of State ("DOS") will also implement public charge requirements for overseas applications, including the new DS-5540, DOS Public Charge Questionnaire.

The Public Charge Rule, issued in August of 2019 prescribes how the Department of Homeland Security will determine whether a person is inadmissible to the United States based on a “likelihood of becoming a public charge at any time in the future”. The final rule also addresses USCIS’s “authority to issue public charge bonds in the context of applications for adjustment of status,” and includes a requirement that those seeking an extension of stay or change of status “demonstrate that they have not received public benefits over the designated threshold since obtaining the nonimmigrant status they seek to extend or change.”

Read the Supreme Court Opinion, here. Read the USCIS announcement, here.

For more information on this rule, please contact us.