If you filed for asylum in April or May 2014 in Houston, you should have received an asylum interview by February 2017.
The excruciatingly long wait times are made clear by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in its affirmative asylum scheduling bulletin.
These wait times apply to the third category of asylum seekers. Children are allocated a higher priority. Nevertheless, the asylum system is dogged with delays and immigration courts are over-burdened.
The system is also mired in uncertainty. If your family is waiting outside the United States, a three-year wait can be devastating. Some asylum seekers simply give up and risk returning to persecution or threats to their lives in their home countries.
Immigrants are waiting years for an asylum interview
Increasingly, people are abandoning their cases or trying their luck in Canada where waits can be shorter.
Although asylum is an unpredictable and stressful process, there are some ways you can seek to expedite your asylum interview.
If your case is finished, you may be able to expedite it. In other words, you should have all the evidence gathered and translated if it’s in another language and the affidavit must be finished.
You don’t want a situation in which an asylum seeker fast tracks a case when it’s not complete. An experienced Texas asylum attorney can make sure you are properly prepared for your case.
Of course, asylum seekers need a good reason to expedite their case.
Here are some possible reasons to expedite a case.
1 Illness
If the applicant has a physical or mental health issue, it may be a good reason to expedite a case. It’s necessary to get relevant letters from a doctor and explain how an early interview might help your condition. If the stress of a long wait will make your condition worse that information could be relevant.
2 Severe financial loss
If a long wait will cause a serious financial crisis, this can be another reason to expedite your case.
3 Separation from family members
If you are facing separation from family members it may help your case to expedite an interview. You may have children who rely on you as a breadwinner. If you have suffered persecution in your home country, your family may be facing a threat.
If an asylum applicant is successful, he or she can file petitions to bring a spouse and minor unmarried children to the United States. Many people make the dangerous trip to the United States to seek asylum for their families rather than themselves.
Applicants can help make their case by getting medical evidence together or collecting police reports if family members are threatened or reports of injuries from hospitals.
If you are seeking asylum, our Austin immigration lawyers can help. Find out more about us here or call (512) 399-2311.