Updated Fee Prices
The price to submit an application for a green card or citizenship is soon going to increase. According to the U.S Citizenship and Immigration Services or USCIS, there has been a new rule published this week which officially implements an increase in the immigration application fees. This new rule will go into effect in April first of 2024. This rule will affect most of the forms that are required to become U.S. citizens.
This will make it more expensive for people to get their citizenship. According to the office of Homeland Security Statistics, there are about nine million legal permanent residents that are eligible to apply but choose not to do so.
Immigration attorneys have stated that immigration fees and costs usually always trend higher. While not all of the application fees will increase, it will affect many family-based immigration applications which are the most common applications to U.S. citizenship. USCIS has tried to justify their reasoning for the increase of the fees to which they said its being made “to recover operational costs, reestablish timely case processing, and prevent accumulation of future case backlogs.”
What this means is that the USCIS is desperately trying to get more money to accommodate the incoming asylum population.
What Fees Are Increasing? By How Much?
Now that it has been stated that immigration fees are rising, here is which applications are being affected and by how much:
- K-1 Fiancé Visa, current fee is $535, but it is being increased to $675.
- CR-1 Spousal Visa, current fee is $535, but it is being increased to $675.
- Adjustment of Status (without work/travel permit) current fee is $1,225, but it is being increased to $1,440.
- Adjustment of Status (with work permit), current fee is zero dollars, but it is being increased to F630.
- Adjustment of Status (with travel permit), current fee is zero dollars, but it is being increased to $260.
- Adjustment of Status (with work and travel permit) current fee is $1,760, but it is being increased to $3,005.
It is advised to anyone filing with these applications, to submit them before April first to prevent from having to pay the new fee. Since the year 2016, the USCIS has not had enough income to cover the running costs of the organization. Once COVID-19 hit it got even worse as the number of incoming applications dropped.
As if that was not enough, recently they have been dealing with a big growth in incoming applications which has become a struggle to the agency. Since there are so many people applying, they cannot get to everyone in time and struggle to provide good customer service.
Any Ways to Get Discounts?
Back in 2020 when Trump was running for president, he wanted to increase the immigration fee. But by a lot more than it is being increased right now. The USCIS bumped up the fee for naturalization more than eighty percent and ended the fee waiver for people looking for asylum and shelter.
However, this got immense backlash from the people, and many immigration rights activists sued the USCIS claiming that this violates the law for providing adequate notice and allow public comment. This caused a federal judge to prevent this law from happening.
Fortunately, there are certain ways in which people can decrease the price. This new rule allows people to get discounts on their fees. Anyone that earns below 400 percent of the federal poverty guideline, is able to get a reduced fee rate.
While this increase may be less than what it would have originally been, it is still an increase nonetheless, and many families are having a hard time affording this citizenship fee. There is also the fear that even if the fee is paid and the application is sent in, there is no guarantee that it will be approved.
Pros and Cons
This citizenship application fee increase has definitely taken a toll on people for a good reason. There are going to be many families that will suffer from this increased fee. However, due to this higher fee, the long process time will improve.
Meaning that it will not take nearly as long to get a response back on applications. It may take as little as 6 months to wait for naturalization. However, it all depends on the state. Some applicants may also need to be required to pass an English and a Civics test. Nonetheless people will continue to struggle with these new citizenship applications prices.
Written By Erika Cano
Sources:
US Today: The cost of US citizenship is about to rise
Citizen Path: New USCIS Fee Increase Published by Biden Administration
BOUNLESS: USCIS Fees To Increase In April 2024
Featured and Inset Image Courtesy of 401(K) 2012 Flickr Page – Creative Commons License
