SECTION 2: AN END TO THE CRISIS? A PETITION AND APPEAL TO OUR CONGRESSIONAL LEADERS

We, the undersigned, are petitioning the members of the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate, to ask for oversight of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and the National Benefits Council’s (NBC) offices’ implementation of the Hague Adoption Convention as provided by the US Congress.

The US Congress has stated in its adoption of the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption that ALL transitional cases (i.e., cases in which an adoption procedure was begun BEFORE the Hague came into effect) can legally continue the adoption process under the original I-600A form for orphan processing until the adoptions are finalized. However, many USCIS offices, and the National Benefits Council (NBC), are reportedly ignoring this part of the Hague Convention as passed by Congress.

The Hague Convention on International Adoption, which was implemented this year, states the following regarding the transition rule:

"SEC. 505 (b) TRANSITION RULE
The Convention and this Act shall not apply--
(1) in the case of a child immigrating to the United states, if the application for advance processing of an orphan petition or petition to classify an orphan as an immediate relative for the child is filed before the effective date described in subsection (a)(2)" which was April 1, 2008.

A USCIS Fact Sheet (Hague Adoption Convention) dated February 29, 2008, clearly acknowledges this: “Prospective adoptive parent(s) who file Form I-600A or Form I-600 prior to April 1, 2008, may continue to process their adoptions under the current orphan regulations…Prospective adoptive parents who seek to adopt a child under the orphan process will continue to follow the filing rules for Form I-600A or Form I-600.”
However, many USCIS offices are violating this requirement and are refusing to “grandfather” those adoptive parents whose adoption was in process prior to April 1, 2008; these bureaus are breaking the law.

This blatant disregard of the requirement for grandfather status of families in process prior to April 1, 2008, has caused and will cause many hardships for the 10,000 to 20,000 families currently under the I-600A program who, due to China’s current slow rate of referral, are being forced to renew their US paperwork between 3 and 5 times before their adoption is completed. These hardships include:

• DISRUPTION OF THE ADOPTION PROCESS: If USCIS is permitted to continue to break the law, many waiting parents will be forced to seek a new adoption agency that has achieved Hague approval in order to complete their adoption. This change of agency could cause China to disrupt the adoption process, as China no longer allows parents registered in China for an adoption to switch from one agency to another.

•EXCESSIVE ADDITIONAL EXPENSES: Waiting parents who are forced to switch filing status from I-600A to I-800A will incur many fees of several thousand dollars, such as new agency fees and new home study fees. These fees will present a hardship to many families who have already paid for these services.

•DELAY OF ADOPTION: The current processing time for an I-800A application is reported to be 6 months. If USCIS continues to violate the law, the result will be a deluge of paperwork, as the thousands of waiting China parents logged in with Form I-600A begin the long process of renewing through Form I-800A. The processing time will likely become even longer, and this will result in parents being unable to accept their referral from China when it is received, and could result in China pulling their referral, or at the least will delay their child joining their family by many, many months.

•INCREASED TIME IN INSTITUTIONS FOR ORPHANS: The delays caused by parents being forced to switch to Form I-800A will leave Chinese infants in institutions for many months more. These infants will be at even greater risk for developmental delays and attachment disorders, and their quality of life will be diminished as a direct result of USCIS and NBC ignoring the proper application of the law as written.

Homeland Security is using the following justification for their actions: When a family has received its 171-H approval from HS, it lasts 18 months. Families then have 1 renewal for which they don't pay. It is a “free renewal.” After that, HS considers their application "new" - in this way they can charge the family for a new application. HOWEVER, THIS IS USCIS’ INTERPRETATION OF THA LAW, AND NOT THE LAW AS WRITTEN. As for a free renewal, without question, families who are waiting for a referral would gladly pay the I600A renewal fee a second or third time. We are not asking for handouts ; we are simply asking that the law be upheld, and that we not be subjected to unlawful and unnecessary hardships by a rogue interpretation of the law.

Currently, there is no reason for any of these situations to occur. The law is explicitly clear and states that prospective adoptive families who filed for adoption using Form I-600a or Form I-600 prior to April 28, 2008, may continue their adoption process using this same paperwork. This is not a suggestion; IT IS THE LAW AS PASSED BY YOU, OUR ELECTED OFFICIALS.

However, Homeland Security’s CIS bureau and the National Benefits Council (NBC) have ignored and continue to ignore the law; these government agencies are adversely disrupting the lives of thousands of waiting adoptive families and children, causing undue hardship, and unconsciously engaging in racial prejudice.

THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE TO US, THE WAITING PARENTS, THE FRIENDS AND FAMILIES OF THE WAITING PARENTS, THE AGENCIES THAT WORK WITH THE ADOPTIVE PARENTS, THE CHILDREN WHO SIT IN ORPHANAGES WITHOUT A VOICE OR AN ADVOCATE, AND THE BROADER VOTING PUBLIC OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. USCIS AND NBC MUST BE MADE ACCOUNTABLE, AND MUST BE MADE TO ADHERE TO THE LETTER OF THE LAW.

We, the undersigned, therefore respectfully request that you, our elected officials, demand that USCIS and NBC allow grandfathering until the adoption is completed, and not until they simply don’t feel like doing it anymore. USCIS and NBC must be made to uphold the Hague Convention as approved by Congress and allow all the tens of thousands of waiting families who began their adoptions as I-600A cases to continue, and ultimately conclude their adoption as begun, using forms I-600A, and I-600.