UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA MARWAH AL IHSAN AL-GHARAWY, et al., Plaintiffs, Civil Action No. 21-1521 (RDM) v. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY, et al., Defendants. MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER Plaintiffs Marwah Al Ihsan Al-Gharawy, a U.S. citizen, and her parents, Bushra Hamza Al-Kaabi and Ihsan Hadi Al-Gharawy, both Iraqi citizens, bring this action under the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 706(1), and the Mandamus Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1361, to compel Defendants—various departments and officers of the United States—to adjudicate the immigrant visa applications of Bushra Hamza Al-Kaabi and Ihsan Hadi Al-Gharawy, which have been pending for over eight years. Dkt. 1 (Compl.). Plaintiffs argue that Defendants have unreasonably delayed adjudicating their applications and have thereby violated the APA, 5 U.S.C. § 555(b), and the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Defendants have moved to dismiss a subset of Defendants for lack of standing and the case as a whole for failure to state a claim. Dkt. 8. For the reasons that follow, the Court will GRANT in part and DENY in part Defendants’ motion. I. BACKGROUND A. Factual Background The following factual allegations are taken from Plaintiffs’ complaint, which the Court accepts as true for the purposes of Defendants’ motion to dismiss. See Harris v. D.C. Water & Sewer Auth., 792 F.3d 65, 67 (D.C. Cir. 2015); Fragola v. Kenific Grp., Inc., No. 21-cv-1423, 2022 WL 1908824, at *1 (D.D.C. June 3, 2022). On January 24, 2013, Marwah Al Ihsan Al-Gharawy, who is a U.S. citizen, submitted Form I-130 (an Alien Relative Petition) to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) on behalf of her parents, Bushra Hamza Al-Kaabi and Ihsan Hadi Al-Gharawy, who are Iraqi citizens. Dkt. 1 at 4, 6 (Compl. ¶¶ 2–3, 16). USCIS approved Plaintiffs’ visa petition in August 2013 and forwarded it to the National Visa Center (“NVC”), a division of the State Department, for additional processing. Id. at 6 (Compl. ¶ 17). Bushra Hamza Al-Kaabi submitted Form DS- 260 (Application for Immigrant Visa and Alien Registration) to the NVC on August 18, 2013, and Ihsan Hadi Al-Gharawy submitted the same form on November 20, 2015. Id. (Compl. ¶ 18). On October 3, 2016, Bushra Hamza Al-Kaabi and Ihsan Hadi Al-Gharawy interviewed with a consular official at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. Id. at 7 (Compl. ¶ 20). At that interview, the two were handed a “visa refusal sheet,” which advised them that their “immigrant visa application needs further administrative processing.” Id. Embassy officials retained Plaintiffs’ passports, which Plaintiffs were advised would be returned “once the administrative processing was completed and their visas issued” so that the visas could be “placed on their respective passports.” Id.1 1 At Plaintiffs’ request, the Embassy later returned Plaintiffs’ passports to enable them to travel internationally while their applications remained pending. Dkt. 1 at 7 n.2 (Compl.). 2 Over the ensuing eight years, Plaintiffs made several inquiries into the status of their applications, to no avail. Id. (Compl. ¶ 21). Plaintiffs last …
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