Client Alert!
The Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced a final rule to strengthen the integrity of the T nonimmigrant status (T visa) and ensure eligible victims of human trafficking can access protections and stabilizing benefits on a timely manner. T nonimmigrant status enables certain victims of human trafficking to remain in the United States for an initial period of up to four years.
T nonimmigrant status offers protection to victims and strengthens the ability of law enforcement agencies to detect, investigate, and prosecute human trafficking. This final rule clarifies T nonimmigrant status eligibility and application requirements and includes provisions to reduce potential barriers to victims and enable USCIS officers to adjudicate victims’ applications more efficiently. The final rule also improves the program’s integrity by clarifying the reporting and evidentiary requirements for victims of trafficking, which will better help law enforcement act on reports of trafficking.
Key elements of the final rule include:
- Updating and clarifying definitions – including serious harm, abuse, and law enforcement agency – to ensure consistency and standards as described in the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000, as amended;
- Improving program efficiency by clarifying reporting and evidentiary requirements on the outset to decrease requests for additional evidence;
- Streamlining law enforcement agencies’ ability to act on reports of trafficking by requiring victims to report instances of trafficking to the correct law enforcement of jurisdiction; and
- Simplifying the bona fide determination and adjudication process, while continuing to uphold fraud prevention measures.
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