18-3391-cv Schwebel v. Crandall, et al UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT August Term 2019 (Argued: December 9, 2019 Decided: July 22, 2020) Docket No. 18-3391-cv RONNIT SCHWEBEL, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. KRISTINE R. CRANDALL, Acting Director, Nebraska Service Center, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, CHAD F. WOLF, Acting Secretary, United States Department of Homeland Security, Defendants-Appellants. ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK Before: SACK, CHIN, AND BIANCO, Circuit Judges. Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (McMahon, C.J.), concluding that defendants- appellants' denial of plaintiff-appellee's application pursuant to the Child Status Protection Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1153(h), for adjustment of status to lawful permanent resident was arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 701 et seq. The district court set aside defendants-appellants' October 17, 2017 decision denying plaintiff-appellee's adjustment of status application and directed defendants-appellants to reopen and readjudicate the application. AFFIRMED. JEFFREY A. FEINBLOOM, Feinbloom Bertisch LLP, Rye, New York, for Plaintiff-Appellee. BRANDON M. WATERMAN, Assistant United States Attorney (Christopher Connolly, Assistant United States Attorney, on the brief), for Audrey Strauss, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, New York, New York, for Defendants-Appellants. CHIN, Circuit Judge: In 2007, when she was seventeen years old, plaintiff-appellee Ronnit Schwebel applied for adjustment of her immigration status to lawful permanent resident under the Child Status Protection Act (the "CSPA"), 8 U.S.C. § 1153(h), as a "derivative beneficiary" of her mother. On June 12, 2007, the U.S. Department of State announced that employment visas were available and that 2 applications could be submitted from July 1, 2007 to August 17, 2007. The Schwebel family's immigration attorney recommended that Schwebel file her application immediately. She agreed, and her lawyer submitted her application a few days before the application period opened to account for processing delays. The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services ("USCIS") received the application four days early, but, in violation of its internal procedures, it failed to advise Schwebel of any issue with or defect in her application. Instead, despite inquiries from Schwebel's lawyer, USCIS did not respond for several years, at which point it advised Schwebel that she was required to submit a new application. By then, circumstances had changed such that Schwebel was no longer statutorily eligible to adjust status under the CSPA and USCIS denied her application. On November 3, 2017, Schwebel commenced this action pursuant to the Administrative Procedure Act (the "APA"), 5 U.S.C. § 701 et seq., against defendants-appellants Kristine R. Crandall, Acting Director, Nebraska Service Center, USCIS, and Chad F. Wolf, Acting Secretary, United States Department of Homeland Security (together, the "government"), alleging that she qualified as a "child" under the CSPA, 8 U.S.C. § 1153(h), and that the decision to deny her 3 application for adjustment of status to lawful permanent resident was arbitrary, capricious, or otherwise contrary to law. The parties cross-moved for summary ...
Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals