A lawsuit against USCIS as the visa fee hikes set to take effect from October 2

American Immigration Lawyers Association and eight others have sued the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (UCIS) over the visa fee hike that comes into effect from October 2.

The USCIS increased the visa fees across all the categories, which according to the lawsuit is unlawful. It claims that the fee hikes were being diverted to enforcement activity. The lawsuit, filed on August 20, names Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Ken Cuccunelli, acting Deputy Secretary of DHS.

In August, DHS approved the Final Rule, which increase the fee across all categories including work visa such as H-1B and L-1 and also naturalisation. Final Rule was first introduced in November 2019

Visa fee for H-1B was increased by 20 percent to $560. For L-1, there was a 77 percent hike to $815. For companies that have more than 50 employees and over 50 percent of the workforce on H-1B or L-1 will pay an additional $4000 or $4500, respectively, as visa fee.

Immigration lawyers have also pointed out that the fee hikes will increase the cost of family-based green card to $2830 from $1760 and citizenship would increase to $1170 from $640. This would particularly impact asylum seekers since the Final Rule did away with fee waiver for asylum seekers who are seeking employment.

According to the lawsuit, the Final Rule that increases the fees are unlawful for multiple reasons.

For one, it was proposed under Kevin McAleenan and issued under Chad Wolf, both of whom assumed the title of Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security without constitutional or statutory authority. “The Final Rule is therefore void and without effect under the Homeland Security Act, the Federal Vacancies Reform Act of 1998 and the Appointments Clause of the United States Constitution,” the lawsuit said.

The rule is diverting the visa fees by deterring asylum seekers and low-income applicants for enforcement, which is unlawful, the lawsuit said.