Statutes of Liberty

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Victoria Khaydar, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

We think of the state as all-knowing, but, as the anthropologist James Scott pointed out in Seeing Like The State, Leviathan is born blind. In order to impose order, the state must first be able to see its subjects as individuals who can be tracked and categorized. Human nature tosses sand in the state’s eyes. People change names (upon birth, upon marriage, upon divorce, upon whim), occupations, addresses, incomes, and the interpersonal relationships amongst themselves. This creates a massive problem for the state: How can it even know the identities of its subjects?

In the United States, the government has traditionally relied mostly on self-reporting for citizens. Readers of this column will not be surprised to learn that we treat immigrants quite differently: we demand stacks of identifying documents, fingerprints, and biometric information as part of benefits adjudication and deportation proceedings. The Department of Homeland Security has quietly proposed to expand this system by collecting more biometric data, more frequently – including DNA! – and, in parallel, to expand this system by collecting biometric data on U.S. Citizens who interact with the immigration system. The purpose of this article is to explain what the Department of Homeland Security proposes to do, and then to speculate briefly about why.

The Department of Homeland Security proposes to expand its biometrics collection system in the following ways:

1. Expand the types of biometrics collected from immigrants. Currently, only fingerprint, signature, and facial recognition data are collected at biometrics. That’s not enough! DHS proposes to collect “ocular image, palm print, voice print, and DNA” from immigrants.
2. Expand the frequency of biometrics collection. Currently, DHS frequently reuses biometric information when an applicant applies for a subsequent benefit. (For example, if you apply for a green card, DHS collects your biometric information; later, when you apply for citizenship, DHS reuses its electronic records. No longer!) DHS’s view is that the enforcement benefits of “continuous vetting” outweigh the inconvenience and cost of repeated biometric appointments.
3. Expand the population of immigrants subject to biometrics collection. Currently, immigrant applicants under the age of 14 are exempt from biometrics collection. (The fingerprints and faces of children have a remarkable, and from the perspective of Leviathan, irritating propensity for change.) DHS’s view is that these challenges can be overcome, and overcoming them is worth doing for enforcement reasons.
4. Expand the categories of people subject to biometrics collection. Currently, U.S. citizens who interact with the immigration system are generally exempt from biometrics collection. Not anymore! DHS proposes that any U.S. Citizen who participates in an immigration application – as a petitioning spouse, say, or as a financial supporter – must report for biometrics collection, including, potentially, the aforementioned DNA collection.

DHS’s purported justification for collecting biometric data en masse from US citizens is “protecting vulnerable populations.” For example, DHS suggests that in the current system, immigrants are insufficiently protected from convicted sex offenders and domestic abusers – collecting biometric information from every single U.S. citizen involved in the immigration system would help DHS to protect vulnerable immigrants more thoroughly.

DHS’s purported justification for collecting biometrics data repeatedly from non-citizens is that “continuous immigration vetting and […] continued and subsequent evaluation” is meant “to ensure they continue to present no risks to national security or public safety subsequent to their entry.”

The real reasons for this expansion of state power are known only to the Trump Administration. But we would suggest that this new program of biometrics collection is likely to be expensive, duplicative, ineffective, and creepy. The current biometrics system already requires millions of appointments per year, supervised by an army of contractors. Adding millions more appointments will ensure that more contractors get paid, but it is unclear how retaking fingerprints will make it easier to track immigrants over time. Moreover, demanding DNA submission as part of the immigration process is enormously invasive. The Supreme Court, in Maryland v. King, ruled that routine collection of DNA is permissible for those who are “already in valid police custody for a serious offense supported by probable cause.” Subjecting millions of immigrants (and US citizens!) per year to a data collection standard meant for suspected felons strikes us as just one more example of this administration’s hostility to immigrants and their families.

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Victoria Khaydar, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

The purpose of this sponsored post is to introduce Victoria Khaydar, our brilliant new associate. We’re proud to have her! By way of introduction, here are a few questions to Victoria from the Pointy-Headed Boss.

PHB: How did you come to the practice of immigration law?

Victoria: This will sound cheesy, but I was definitely influenced by my own family’s immigration journey. Navigating complex immigration minefields as a child probably left me a few scars and anxieties. I want to lend others a helping hand, at least to the extent that I have figured this immigration thing out.

PHB: Why do you enjoy the practice of immigration law. (“Big assumption there!” – Ed.)

Victoria: I love that immigration law is a human-centered practice. An immigration case is basically a human interest story with a problem you get to solve. This was always my favorite part of law school casebooks before they got to the boring legal principles.

Plus, you get to meet people from all over the world! I have no data to back this up but immigration attorneys are very good at geography and language trivia.

(more…)

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Victoria Khaydar, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

As we’ve repeatedly written, the Trump Administration has a resource scarcity problem – it simply does not have the detention beds and transportation facilities to deport as many migrants as it wishes. Moreover, it does not have enough immigration judges to handle the pending immigration docket, which still has nearly four million pending cases. Recruiting and training new immigration judges takes time. Time is a luxury for the Trump Administration, which senses (we believe) that it has a limited window of opportunity to implement its agenda. So, what to do? The subject of this advertorial is the Administration’s latest idea: combing the Pentagon for lawyers and slotting them into immigration judge roles. For now, the Administration is just relaxing the rules and asking for ‘volunteers.’ But hundreds of military immigration judges may be coming soon to courthouses near you.

First, a brief backgrounder on immigration judges. Immigration Judges are not Article 3 judges, appointed with Senate approval and given life tenure. Instead, Immigration Judges are Article 1 officials – administrative law judges, in DC parlance – who work within the Department of Justice as civil servants. Presidents can (and do) fire or reassign immigration judges; President Trump has been more energetic than most of his predecessors in both hiring and firing.

Presidents of both parties have worked to expand the ranks of immigration judges. Over the past decade, the number almost tripled, from 250 to 735, before the firings and reassignments at the beginning of the current Presidential term pushed the number below 700 again.

(more…)

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq. and Janice Chen, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

On Friday, September 19, 2025, the Trump Administration published a Proclamation – “Restriction on Entry of Certain Non-Immigrant Workers” – which purported to impose a $100,000 ‘supplemental fee’ on all petitions, with the penalty being that visas – that is, entry documents provided by the US Embassies and consulates abroad – would not be issued for any beneficiary of a petition for which the supplemental fee had not been paid. The Proclamation did not explain whether this $100,000 ‘supplemental fee’ applied only to prospective H-1B petitions or to current petitions. The plain text of the Proclamation suggested that it applied to all H-1B workers “currently outside the United States” as of 12:01 AM EST on September 21, 2025. Therefore, every H-1B visaholder who happened to be outside the U.S. on September 19th had excellent reason to panic. Corporations, including Google, and Amazon, reacted rationally by telling their workers to drop everything and fly home, pronto.

On Saturday, September 20, 2025, USCIS Director Joseph B. Edlow published a one-page memorandum that walked back the worst elements of the Proclamation. It clarified matters, at least to a degree, by stating that the proclamation “only applies prospectively to petitions that have not yet been filed” and not to current H-1B visaholders. On Sunday, September 21, 2025, the Department of State and Customs and Border Protection released similar clarifications.

The result of this haphazard rollout was – predictably – chaos, which sparked criticism across the ideological spectrum, from Steve Bannon to tech industry trade groups. Even the attempts to reassure current H-1B visaholders fell flat, because – incredibly – the Administration appears not to have decided yet whether the $100,000 surcharge is annual or once every three years, or whether it applies to changes of employer outside the annual lottery process.

This chaos managed to overshadow another massive change to the H-1B process – a notice of proposed regulatory action, by which the Administration is seeking to eliminate the current H-1B lottery, which allocates visas randomly so long as the proposed employment meets the threshold qualifications and does not fall the prevailing wages observed by the Department of Labor. In its place, the Administration is seeking to create a ‘weighted’ system which prioritizes positions that are being paid at higher than the prevailing wage. Note that, unlike the 2021 proposed revisions, this new proposed system doesn’t prioritize the highest-wage positions, as an absolute matter, but rather prioritizes those positions with the greatest difference between the wage offered to the foreign employee and the prevailing wage. If the prevailing wage for legal secretaries is $50,000 per year and you offer to pay a foreign legal secretary $150,000 per year, the new weighted lottery system prioritizes your application over an application for a foreign AI researcher who earns much more.

It’s difficult to say why the Administration rolled out the new $100,000 surcharge in this way. It seems likely that the speed of the rollout was intentional; if the Administration had provided even two weeks’ notice, companies would have rushed to file new applications before the deadline. But, given that intentionality, it is hard to understand why the Administration didn’t foresee the inevitable consequences of sloppy drafting – in cost, heartache, and legal bills – and work to prevent them.

Who was at fault for this? We’ll have to wait for the memoirs and tell-alls to be released. The official White House ‘Rapid Response 47’ Twitter account offered an interesting theory: “Corporate lawyers and others with agendas are creating a lot of FAKE NEWS around President Trump’s H-1B Proclamation.”

The White House didn’t mean to include Statutes of Liberty in its criticism, and properly so. We don’t traffic in fake news. We’re real advertisers.

Readers are, as always, invited to ask questions, real or fake,, and we will do our best to respond.

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Taryn Druge, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

Our immigration system is, in the main, funded by immigrants rather than tax dollars. Nearly 90% of immigration benefits applications – green card applications, work permit applications, the new asylum application, H-1B petitions, you name it – come with checks or money orders attached. Soon – on October 28, 2025 – that venerable system will come to an end. Inevitably, many people will miss the memo, and enormous numbers of applications will be returned to sender. The purpose of this sponsored post is to diminish that number slightly, and to offer a guide on how to make payments using the new system.

Method 1: ACH Transaction Using Form G-1650

The first method for paying via bank transfer, using Form G-1650. To do this, you have to hold a bank account – either checking or savings – at a U.S. bank. You have to provide the routing and account numbers for that bank account, and you have to sign a piece of paper authorizing the transfer of a specified sum of money. (If those elements sound familiar to you, that’s because they are the key characteristics of a check.) Use a computer to complete the form, print it, sign it, and attach it to your benefits application.

Interestingly, USCIS notes that you may need to contact your bank to permit USDHS to debit funds by ACH, and so it would be wise to speak to your bank to ensure that the Agency Location Codes – at this date, 7001010330, 7001010331, 7001010335, and 7001010390 – are authorized for debits.

Method 2: Credit Card Authorization Using Form G-1450

The second method is to authorize a credit card payment using Form G-1450. To do this, you have to have a working credit card, debit card, or prepaid debit card. Use a computer to complete the form, print it, sign it, and attach it to the benefits application.

USCIS currently notes that it only accepts credit card payments for payments to the USCIS Service Centers or USCIS Lockboxes. Currently, those two types of offices accept the overwhelming majority of payments, but some payments are made directly to the USCIS Field Offices – e.g., applications for emergency advance parole. It is unclear how those payments will be handled, but the current Policy Manual states that either a check or Form G-1450 will be acceptable.

Method 3: Request a Waiver Using Form G-1651

The third (and somewhat questionable) method is to attach a check or money order made out to “U.S. Department of Homeland Security” and request a waiver of the electronic payment requirement via Form G-1651. We can’t provide you with a copy of that form. USCIS promised to provide it by August 29, 2025, but they haven’t done so. USCIS says that these will be the acceptable categories for an exemption:

• Individuals who do not have access to banking services or electronic payment systems;
• Electronic disbursement would cause undue hardship, as contemplated in 31 CFR Part 208;
• National security or law enforcement related activities where non-EFT transactions are necessary or desirable; and
• Other circumstances as determined by the Secretary of the Treasury, as reflected in regulations or other guidance.

Whether these exemptions are real or not will depend on the bureaucratic apparatus. The biggest category by far is individuals who do not have access to banking services or electronic payment systems, which includes many immigrants. (Without a social security number, it is difficult to open a bank account.) USCIS may allow such applicants to pay via check or money order, attaching a Form G-1651; or USCIS may argue that the availability of prepaid debit cards over the counter means that everyone has effective access to electronic payment systems.

Our view is that this change is likely to make it harder for many people to apply for benefits on their own. Of course, as lawyers, we think it’s generally advisable to engage counsel to represent you before USCIS. We will have no trouble adapting to the new payment system. But this is just another little layer of complexity which will make an already complex system even more challenging for ordinary people to navigate – and, as such, we think it’s an unwelcome change.

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Taryn Druge, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

Our little law office is hiring for two positions: Attorney and Legal Intern (Fall Semester). The details and tips on how to apply are below, in Q&A style.

Q: Hiring, eh? How much cash on the barrel?

A: Depends on the position. The Attorney position comes with a starting salary of $75,000, with guaranteed bonuses if you meet fairly achievable revenue targets. Those bonuses are $20,000 and $25,000, respectively, so the range of compensation is $75,000 – $120,000 per year. The Law Clerk position is paid hourly, and the amount depends on your background. (Certain local law schools won’t give you class credit if we pay you. We prefer to pay you, but we can forgo paying you if that’s what you need.)

Q: What? I thought that lawyers dove into piles of gold coins all day, like Scrooge McDuck!

A: It depends. On Wall Street, we are reliably informed that big law firm partners can make more than $15,000,000 per year – more than the bankers who pay them! Immigration lawyers are much more modestly compensated.

Q: Why should I work for you? ICE pays a $50K starting bonus and I want to deport illegals with my absolute boys!

A: We offer great benefits and a wonderful place to work.

Generous Benefits
We offer extremely generous benefits – better than every local nonprofit, including paid parental leave, 70% of health insurance / vision / dental covered from your first day on, FSA, retirement plan with a generous match – you name it, we offer it!

Easy Commute
Commuting into DC is for masochists. Working here isn’t. Our beautiful old office, built in 1870, is in the heart of Falls Church. We have plenty of free parking and a verdant, wooded landscape around our building.

Helping People in Need
Our clients come from all walks of life. Some come from vulnerable circumstances. You’ll work with them, and you’ll make a huge difference for them.

Collegial Environment
We pride ourselves doing cases one at a time. You won’t be forced to take cases. Instead, you’ll evaluate cases on your own, and build your own docket within the firm based on your own capacity and interests. We offer both independence and mentorship for new lawyers.

Q: Do you offer Work from Home?

A: No. Why? Because, as noted, we work with many people who come from vulnerable circumstances. These clients are best served by meeting with you in person. We are unwilling to compromise on this point, because, shorn of the verbiage, WFH means telling poor people to go pound sand.

Q: You don’t sound fun.

A: But in reality, I’m actually very fun, relaxed, and easy-going.

Q: How do I apply?

A: Email James at [email protected]. Send a CV and a cover letter.

Q: What are the requirements for each position?

A: For Attorney, we require a bar license and a JD. We’re happy to hire new lawyers. Spanish fluency is a big plus. Immigration experience is, of course, a plus too.

A(2): For Legal Intern, we require that you be enrolled at a local law school. That’s it! We’re here to help with your education and pay you a decent wage.

Questions about the jobs? Ask in the comments. We’ll respond, just like we always do.

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Taryn Druge, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

Our erstwhile Managing Attorney is taking some well-deserved time off this week, which means he is gazing out at some version of the above vista, while fending off mosquitoes, snakes, or possibly, bears. Meanwhile, since it has clearly been a slow news week in the field of immigration law, we thought we would take a break from the usual legal insights, and instead introduce you to the new member of our team. Meet our summer law clerk: Ava Lansbury!

Ava started with us just after Memorial Day, and she has already proved herself indispensable in helping to make sure that the associates don’t burn down the place down in the boss’ absence. We asked her a few questions to find out what she’s making of the experience so far.

Q: Where are you from?

A: I’m from Arlington!

Q: Ahh. A bona fide local. Are there any fun facts about your name that you would like our readers to know?

A: Hmmm. My parents picked the name Ava because they liked it (which is a good reason, but not a very interesting one). Lansbury got changed from Landesberger when my grandfather came over from Austria.

Q: That is actually very interesting! There’s probably a whole untold story there. What drew you to want to try out this work in immigration law?

A: I want to help people! Although I’m not totally sure of what my future career will be, I know I want to do something where I can make a positive impact on other people’s lives. I’m also very interested in the way the law operates. One of my favorite classes I’ve taken so far in college was Philosophy of Law. I also wanted an opportunity to work on my Spanish over the summer.

Q: Did you have any prior experience or contact with the immigration system prior to starting here?

A: Not really. A lot of my Spanish classes in both high school and college have had some kind of focus on immigration and related issues, but I have a lot to learn!

Q: Well, you’ve picked quite a time to get into this. You have been with us for a whole seven days now. What is one thing that has surprised you so far?

A: One thing that has surprised me is how many different countries our clients represent. Over the last week, I have gotten to learn so much about other countries and cultures.

Q: What’s the most annoying task that you’ve been asked to do in your time here?

A: This is hard because everything I’ve done has been new and interesting to me! But I have to say filling out a whole new form because only one question got changed, that was pretty tedious.

Q: What are your plans for the remainder of your time in school?

A: In the fall I’ll be studying abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina! My classes will be focused on social movements and human rights. After that, I’ll finish up my last three semesters as a Sociology and Spanish double major while playing for the Smith Softball team.

Welcome aboard, Ava! We are excited to have you with us through the summer. And I’m sure you can’t wait to discover all the new form versions that USCIS will be forcing us to redo during this time.

As always, we are grateful for your questions and comments, and will do our best to respond.

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Taryn Druge, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

What on earth is happening at the airports? The answer is, at least in the first instance, not a matter of law, but policy.

The Trump administration is using existing legal authority in wholly novel and frightening ways. In so doing, the administration may succeed in its aim of raising barriers to admission, at least in the short term — but it may hinder its own objectives in the long term, by creating adverse legal precedents when its policies are challenged. Time will tell.

First, the legal landscape, which pre-existed the Trump administration. The airport is a border zone. At the border, CBP agents man a metaphorical wall — a gatehouse, if you will — and apply their training to decide who may or may not enter. Mere possession of proper entry papers guarantees nothing. For example, a tourist holding a visitor visa may be refused entry if the inspector believes that the tourist intends to work illegally. A green card holder can have the green card stripped — and even be detained, pending deportation proceedings — if the inspector believes that the green card holder is deportable, for criminal or other reasons.

Now, the policy. The Trump administration has turned every knob up to eleven in the inspection process. Here are a few examples:

1. A tourist who (allegedly) confessed that she intended to do a free tattoo for a friend in exchange for some clothes from a friend of hers — well, she was found to be seeking unauthorized employment in the barter economy. She was detained for weeks, then deported.
2. A lawful permanent resident who (allegedly) was once charged with (but not convicted of) misdemeanor drug charges has been detained since March following an airport encounter.
3. A Russian scientist leading a Harvard lab, traveling with (allegedly) improperly labelled frog eggs, was arrested and has been detained for more than two months. She is an opponent of the Putin regime, and rightfully fears being deported back to Russia.
4. A physician holding a valid H-1B visa who (allegedly) admitted to attending the funeral of Hassan Nasrallah was detained and deported.
5. Disturbingly, there have been at least two incidents of U.S. citizen lawyers being (allegedly) detained at the border. In one of those incidents, the attorney was pressured to turn over his phone for a search, despite the fact that his phone contained reams of confidential client information.

This behavior has been widely reported, but it is also disputed; CBP says that media coverage of the examples described above is exaggerated or otherwise unreliable, and the truth of each of these claims is unclear. What is clear is that the Trump administration has turned up the heat at airports and border posts across the country. As these events continue, we expect that legal challenges will be brought.

Unlike the challenges to other Trump administration immigration initiatives — like the executive order purporting to ban birthright citizenship, or the administration’s efforts to summarily deport alleged members of the Tren de Aragua gang, legal challenges to port of entry enforcement will take longer to be filed. It takes longer to gather the evidence, and the procedural rights of those applying for admission are less substantial than the rights of those already present in the interior. But bad policy, just like good policy, requires rules.

Those rules will be documented, and maintaining those rules produces still more paper: emails, memoranda, messages, and (eventually) depositions and live testimony; in short, evidence, which is just what the courts will weigh in their adjudication of whether these new policies comply with U.S. law.

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Taryn Druge, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

On March 12, 2025, the Department of Homeland Security reactivated a long-dormant part of the United States Code – the Smith Act, also known as the Alien Registration Act of 1940.

The Smith Act required that all aliens in the United States register, and be fingerprinted, at a local post office. With war looming in 1940, the U.S. government was concerned about the presence of foreign nationals in the United States, and so it sought to collect information about those present.

Attorney General Robert Jackson promised immigrants that they would not be punished for registration – he stated, in a radio address, that those with “irregularity connected with their entrance” would “receive all consideration” for immigration relief if they registered, and the Justice Department followed through on that promise by waiving the deportation of thousands of registrants. After the war, the fingerprinting requirement fell into desuetude but was never removed from the ever-growing corpus of federal law.

The Trump administration, in Executive Order 14159 (“Protecting the American People Against Invasion”), directed the Department of Homeland Security to institute procedures to reactivate the Smith Act’s fingerprinting and registration requirement. On March 12, 2025, the Department of Homeland Security issued a regulation (technically, an Interim Final Rule) with the following requirements:

1. All aliens 14 years of age and older who are not previously registered and fingerprinted must do so within 30 days of entering the country.
2. Parents or legal guardians must apply for similarly situated alien children.
3. Any similarly situated alien who turns 14 must register within 30 days.

The registration process starts online, with the submission of a new form (Form G-325R) followed by an appointment at a local application support center (ASC) for fingerprinting.

In theory, the registration process kicks off on April 11th – that’s tomorrow! – but we expect that the requirement, like so many other Trump administration immigration innovations, will be enjoined. On March 31, 2025, plaintiffs sued the Department of Homeland Security in the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia, seeking a preliminary injunction to prevent the new registration requirement from going into effect, and a declaration setting aside the new registration requirement as illegal.

In essence, the plaintiffs argue that the Trump administration failed to comply with the Administration Procedure Act, and, by that failure, is attempting to promulgate a highly consequential regulation illegally.

On Tuesday this week, Judge Trevor McFadden – a Trump-appointed federal district court judge – held a hearing to consider the request for a preliminary injunction. Press coverage of the hearing suggests that Judge McFadden was skeptical of the government’s position. He called the reinstitution of the fingerprinting requirement “a big switcheroo” and suggested that the government had “skipped a lot of steps” which might be required under the Administrative Procedure Act. Judge McFadden indicated that he will issue a decision on the preliminary injunction before the program goes into effect tomorrow.

We predict that that Judge McFadden will issue that injunction, and the new fingerprinting requirement will not go into effect pending further litigation. As so frequently, the Trump administration has chosen speed over efficacy in its federal litigation,

If the fingerprinting requirement goes into effect, it is not easy to say whether immigrants should register or not. We decline to take a general position here, because the answer will differ according to each individual situation. Many immigrants – including green card holders, those with pending asylum applications, those who have pending immigration court cases, and visaholders who were fingerprinted before arrival – do not need to register anyway under current rules. We advise anyone who thinks that they need to register to consult with an attorney first.

As always, we are grateful for your questions and comments, and will do our best to respond.

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Taryn Druge, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

On March 22, 2025, the Trump administration released a memorandum entitled Preventing Abuses of the Legal System and the Federal Court (sic). This memorandum accuses immigration lawyers and law firms of malpractice and misconduct. For example, it asserts that:

1. “The immigration bar, and powerful Big Law pro bono practices, frequently coach clients to conceal their past or lie about their circumstances when asserting their asylum claims.”
2. Immigration attorneys violate the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure by filing cases “for improper purposes” including “to harass, cause unnecessary delay, or needlessly increase the cost of litigation.”
3. Immigration attorneys engage in “frivolous, unreasonable, or vexatious litigation against the United States or in matters before executive departments and agencies of the United States.”

Given the breadth of this widespread (alleged) fraud and malpractice, the memorandum directs the Attorney General to prioritize enforcement of regulations governing attorney conduct and discipline, including referring attorneys for bar sanction, revoking security clearances, and terminating federal contracts with offending law firms.

We applaud this focus on enforcement of ethics rules. We have never filed a frivolous motion or a case unsupported by law, and we never will. We take our responsibilities as officers of the Court seriously, as all lawyers should.

In that spirit, we would like to bring to the attention of the White House and the Attorney General a few recent actions by the Department of Justice which deserve careful investigation and review.

1. In January 2023, Donald Trump and his attorney, Alina Habba, were jointly subject to $937,989.39 in court-ordered sanctions. Federal District Court Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks found that Donald Trump had filed a “completely frivolous” lawsuit, “brought in bad faith for an improper purpose.” Judge Middlebrooks further found that Donald Trump’s lead attorney in the case, Alina Habba, had used “an abusive litigation tactic which amounts to obstruction of justice” — namely, filing a 193-page Amended Complaint with 819 paragraphs in it, which contained 14 counts, named 31 defendants, 10 of whom of which were John Does, and 10 ABC Corporations identified as fictitious and unknown entities. Judge Middlebrooks found that the claims were foreclosed by existing precedent and “no reasonable lawyer would have filed it.” Alina Habba has been nominated by the Trump administration to be the interim United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey — the top federal prosecutor in a very important district. We think that this nomination is not in the spirit of the March 22, 2025 memorandum discouraging vexatious litigation and unethical court filings, and we urge the White House to reconsider her appointment.
2. In March 2025, Judge Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia entered a Temporary Restraining Order which ordered the administration to not deport alleged members of a Venezuelan gang to El Salvador. The administration deported the them anyway. The Justice Department, acting through its attorneys, has failed to explain why it violated the District Court Boasberg’s Temporary Restraining Order. Violating judicial orders, it seems to us, falls squarely within the ambit of the Presidential Memorandum, which urges that lawyers pay special attention to the rules of professional conduct “in cases that implicate national security, [and] homeland security.”

As always, we are grateful for your questions and comments, and will do our best to respond.

This sponsored column is by Law Office of James Montana PLLC. All questions about it should be directed to James Montana, Esq., Janice Chen, Esq., and Taryn Druge, Esq., practicing attorneys at The Law Office of James Montana PLLC, an immigration-focused law firm located in Falls Church, Virginia. The legal information given here is general in nature. If you want legal advice, contact us for an appointment.

The answer to every simple question in our immigration system is: There’s a form for that! Frequently, the answer to more complex questions is: There’s a stack of forms for that! These forms are provided by the immigration authorities, for the use of applicants for immigration benefits, and are updated occasionally to reflect changes in law and policy.

These form updates are usually quite ho-hum. USCIS issues a notice stating that a form has been updated, and gives immigrants (and their lawyers) a grace period during which both the old version of the form and the new version will be accepted. 

In early March, the new administrative decided to Reinvent the Paradigm by issuing a large number of new form versions. These new form versions – which included big ones, like the application for a green card – were virtually identical to the old forms, other than removing language concerning “other gender identity.” But – and this is the key – the old forms were invalid as of the date of issuance of the new forms. No grace period, no transition. What happens if you mailed the form yesterday, and it’s still in transit? Well, it’s invalid today.

This maneuver released a live ferret into the office of every immigration lawyer in the country. We had to stop application packets en route to the post office, because we quite properly feared that the applications would be rejected (or, worse, denied) for failure to provide the correct form version. 

The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) hit the roof, quite properly, over this, and filed a lawsuit. USCIS replied to the lawsuit by saying (1) “[W]hile no definite grace period is being provided, USCIS will exercise its discretion to not reject previous versions of forms that are submitted for a reasonable period after the new versions take effect” and then, (2) by adding a one-month grace period, retroactively, in response to the lawsuit being filed. Our reading of this is that the new political appointees at USCIS were simply not familiar with how the agency works, and so they didn’t think about the problem until someone sued them over it. Our sympathies go out to the poor AUSA who has to explain this chain of events to a grumpy federal judge.

The new one-month grace period has created needless problems – particularly for victims of crime, who will need to obtain new certifications from already overworked police departments and prosecutors – and was, in our view, needlessly stingy. Providing the usual three months of grace period would have allowed most pro se and represented applicants to complete the applications and file them, and would also have allowed the government to update its forms in response to its new policy directives.

As always, we are grateful for your questions and comments, and will do our best to respond.