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Lawsuit over green card delay dismissed
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Posted on Feb 14 2019
The federal court dismissed with prejudice on Tuesday a lawsuit filed by a man and his daughter against officials of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services over an alleged four-year delay in adjudicating her green card petition for him.
Dismissal with prejudice means Chen Chien-Li and his U.S. citizen daughter can no longer re-file the lawsuit.
U.S. District Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona dismissed the case after the parties decided to drop the matter.
Joseph H. Horey, counsel for Chien-Li and his daughter, and assistant U.S. attorney Jessica F. Wesseling, counsel for DHS and USCIS officials, signed the agreement to drop the case.
Horey and Wesseling did not indicate the reason for the dismissal.
Last month, DHS, asked the court to hold the proceedings in this case in light of the then-federal government shutdown. Manglona approved the request.
Chien-Li is a Taiwanese national who lives in the CNMI. His daughter, a U.S. citizen, lives in New York.
The father and daughter sued DHS and USCIS district director for District 26 David Gulick, USCIS director L. Francis Cissna, and U.S. DHS Secretary Kirstjen M. Nielsen, for alleged violation of the Administrative Act.
The plaintiffs asked the court to compel USCIS to adjudicate their pending petition and application.
On Dec. 8, 2014, the daughter filed with USCIS an I-130 petition on behalf of her father, Chien-Li, seeking to have him classified as an immediate relative of a U.S. citizen based on their family relationship.
