As posted on the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) website, on January 20, 2025, President Trump issued Executive Order (“EO”) 14159, “Protecting the American People Against Invasion”. The EO directs the Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) to ensure that aliens comply with their duty to register with the government. Failure to comply with the registration requirement is treated as a civil and criminal enforcement priority. The DHS requires that, with limited exceptions, all aliens 14 years of age or older who were not registered and fingerprinted (if required) when applying for a U.S. visa, and who remain in the United States for 30 days or longer, must apply for registration and fingerprinting. Similarly, parents and legal guardians of aliens below the age of 14 must ensure that those child aliens are registered. Within 30 days of reaching his or her 14th birthday, all previously registered aliens must apply for re-registration
Effective March 11, 2025, The United States Center for Disease Control (“CDC”) has removed from the technical instructions to panel physicians the requirement that immigrant visa applicants receive the COVID-19 vaccination. Panel physicians will no longer determine that an immigrant visa applicant is ineligible for travel based on their failure to receive, or otherwise document, their vaccination against COVID-19. Based on CDC’s updated guidance to panel physicians, which is inline with the recent United States Citizenship and Immigration Services policy, Embassies and Consulates will no longer refuse an immigrant visa application for failure to present documentation that they received the COVID-19 vaccination. Applicants whose medical exams are unexpired and otherwise still valid for travel to the United States, and whom a consular officer previously found ineligible based solely on the applicant’s failure to establish vaccination against COVID-19, may have a new medical exam issued by the panel physician without a
The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) issued a 60-day notice and comment on a proposal to collect information pertaining to social-media handles and associated social media platform names from applicants in an effort to verify identification, streamline public safety screening and related inspections. The proposal, which was published in the Federal Register on March 5, 2025, is in line with President Donald Trump’s January 20, 2025 Executive Order, “Protecting the United States from Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threat” which directs the implementation of uniform vetting procedures. The USCIS will accept comments to the proposed rule until May 5, 2025. If the proposed rule officially becomes part of USCIS vetting standards, it will follow the U.S. Department of State 2019 rule which requires U.S. visa applicants to disclose their social media handles and other social media related information on their DS-160 Nonimmigrant Online Visa
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