It was tough and long fight. We won

USCIS is sneaky, and sometimes they think they can get away with something they shouldn't be doing. Like going against a judge's decision. In July of 2015, Tiffany filed an I-130 application for her husband, Jesus. Jesus had a record of entry without authorization but was back in Mexico. And it took USCIS a while to move this case, but finally, in September 2016 they scheduled Jesus for an interview at the Embassy in Mexico. Everything went well, and USCIS actually approved the visa that day. But as I say, not every decision is final with USCIS, even when it's an approval. Before Jesus could pick up the visa, USCIS changed their minds and asked him to file a waiver for his unlawful entry. So Tiffany and Jesus did, in March of 2017 they sent the I-601A waiver to excuse Jesus' record. USCIS approved the waiver, but their case got stuck in processing. Finally, in March 2019, they called him back in for another interview. But for the second time in this case, USCIS changed their minds. The waiver was revoked after already being approved two years before, and they deemed Jesus as likely to become a public charge. USCIS asked them to file a different waiver, an I-601. So Tiffany and Jesus followed orders and filed the new waiver, hoping to keep their case alive. But they never heard back from USCIS. No approval, no denial. Nothing. And finally, they decided enough was enough and heard about our Writ of Mandamus lawsuits. So we sued Department of Homeland Security in September 2019. DHS is like the "big boss" of immigration, they are the head of USCIS and the National Visa Center. And typically when we file these lawsuits, we don't get much pushback. USCIS will normally try to resolve the case as quickly as possible before the lawsuit reaches a judge. But for some reason, with this particular case, they were ready to fight. And they filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, stating that we had no standing to sue even though the case had been pending for four years at this point. USCIS argued that in May of 2019 before Tiffany and Jesus filed the second waiver, they actually denied the case. Which was absolutely wrong. So we fought them, and we filed a response to their motion to dismiss in January 2020 saying that the case should not be dismissed because USCIS had clearly been taking action after they supposedly denied the case in May. They never denied the case, they were just trying to backtrack and lie to get out of it. And we called them out on it. In April, the case landed in front of a judge. Which is something that USCIS never wants to happen in these lawsuits. And the judge sided with us, ruling that the lawsuit will continue and denied USCIS' motion to dismiss it because they had clearly taken action after they said they "denied" the case. But this is where USCIS got extra sneaky. They tried to go behind the judge's order and filed another motion to dismiss. Now it was a war. And we weren't giving up. On May 1st, 2020, we filed a response to their second motion to dismiss, arguing that they could not dismiss the lawsuit after the Judge already told them they couldn't. But COVID-19 hit, and things were put on pause. Now, I want to give you some perspective. Not only was USCIS constantly changing their minds about this case and going behind court orders, but this lawsuit had now been on file for a year. Typically, our lawsuits only take 60-90 days until USCIS reaches a decision. But they were dragging this one out. In October of 2020, the court asked us to file an amended complaint with everything that happened in this case in the past year. All of USCIS' lying, sneaky ways. So we did, we compiled all of the events into another complaint against them. And ten days later, Tiffany and Jesus received a Request for Evidence for the second waiver that they filed, which USCIS already had. Before we sent the waiver again, USCIS fell. They gave up and approved the waiver, but asked Jesus to do another interview. This would be the third time they interviewed him. But he went, and on April 6th, 2021, Jesus did the third interview. On April 7th, one day after, USCIS finally approved the case. For once and for all, after 6 years of waiting, they gave up on fighting us. Jesus and Tiffany were finally reunited in the United States. Now, this was a rare case; USCIS changed their minds more than once, lied about denying the case and went behind court orders to try to dismiss it. They really didn't want Jesus in the U.S., and they were willing to break rules to get what they wanted. But they picked the wrong people to fight. And we won in the end. Don't stop fighting. Even when it seems like you'll lose, even when USCIS is giving you the runaround. Don't give up. Jim