USCIS Lifts Some Benefit Holds
USCIS announced lifts on certain benefit holds under PM‑602‑0192/3/4 that could affect categories like U.S. citizen petitions, adoptions, refugee registrations for South Africans, and asylum from low‑risk countries — details are still vague and litigation is ongoing. The move could reopen adjudications that had been administratively paused, though practitioners are watching for agency guidance. (x.com)
USCIS issued PM‑602‑0192 on December 2, 2025 and followed with PM‑602‑0194 on January 1, 2026; both memoranda place adjudicative holds and direct comprehensive re‑reviews and remain in effect “until lifted by the USCIS Director,” according to the public memoranda. (uscis.gov; PM‑602‑0192; PM‑602‑0194). (uscis.gov) Federal litigation has produced case‑specific relief: on February 2026, a U.S. District Court in Massachusetts (Judge Angel Kelley) granted an emergency preliminary injunction ordering USCIS to adjudicate a plaintiff’s pending I‑765 within ten days. (District of Massachusetts memorandum and order; Bowser v. Noem docket). (cases.justia.com) Multiple mandamus and APA suits remain active in at least three districts — Behdin in the Northern District of California, Nezameslami in the Northern District of Georgia, and several actions tracked by “Press Unpause” — with dockets showing filings and motions for preliminary injunctions but no single nationwide vacatur of the PMs to date. (Behdin docket; Nezameslami docket; Press Unpause tracker). (pacermonitor.com) Industry trackers reported a USCIS update on March 30, 2026 that agencies and some immigration outlets described as a partial lift: outlets reported resumption of asylum adjudications for certain “lower‑risk” nationalities and a list of specific holds that were “partially lifted” in the agency update published that week. (VisaVerge report, March 30, 2026; GreenCardClock summary, March 31, 2026). (visaverge.com) The U.S. Embassy in South Africa and State/USPRAP partners continue to state that USCIS conducts refugee resettlement interviews and that South African refugee‑referral pathways remain active, even as USCIS screening directives apply to other categories. (U.S. Embassy Pretoria “Refugee Admissions Program for South Africans” page). (za.usembassy.gov) Operational signals diverge: crowd‑sourced case trackers recorded a roughly 40% drop in daily I‑130 approvals in early March 2026, while USCIS’s March updates and practitioner summaries note some holds were narrowed but agency public guidance did not publish a comprehensive, form‑by‑form list of resumed adjudications as of March 31, 2026. (VisaHQ/MyCasesHub data report March 16, 2026; USCIS/third‑party summaries March 30–31, 2026). (visahq.com)
