Biden Could Fix the Logjam If He Wanted To

[GregandNatty 195]

I keep hearing people saying things will change now that Biden is in office, but there honestly has not been much done to fix the real issue we are all facing.  The main issue is the embassies are not doing interviews even close to 2019 levels.   

 

We all need to be raising a stink with our congressman about this.   Lean on Biden to pass an executive order or something that does what ever it takes to ramp up interviews.  Maybe declare the immigration workers essential works and get them vaccinated now so they can ramp up interviews.  All politics and policy aside, there needs to be a ramping up of interviews to fix the logjams.  That's the bottom line. 

Edited February 27, 2021 by GregandNatty

[Mike E 11,739]

How would he fix the log jam of a fee based agency that due to COVID social distancing cannot process cases as fast as pre COVID?

 

Just getting the vaccine doesn’t mean a USCIS employee won’t get infected.  I’ve been current on a vaccine and caught the virus it was supposed to protect me from.
 

Assuming these vaccines are effective, they won’t do any noticeable good until most people are injected.   

 

And why should USCIS employee get higher priority than say someone like me, late 50s with high blood pressure?

[GregandNatty 195]

17 minutes ago, Mike E said:

How would he fix the log jam of a fee based agency that due to COVID social distancing cannot process cases as fast as pre COVID?

 

Just getting the vaccine doesn’t mean a USCIS employee won’t get infected.  I’ve been current on a vaccine and caught the virus it was supposed to protect me from.
 

Assuming these vaccines are effective, they won’t do any noticeable good until most people are injected.   

 

And why should USCIS employee get higher priority than say someone like me, late 50s with high blood pressure?

 

I think a phone call from Biden to the State Department could  fix the issue, but worse case an executive order that orders embassies to ramp up interviews would fix alot of this.    I'm not saying we need to be at pre-covid levels, but maybe even 50% would be a reasonable place to be.  We aren't anywhere close to that.   See attached.

The issue isn't the entire immigration system, but the people doing interviews.  Get these people vaccinated.  Absolutely all of the science about the current vaccines say without exception that every vaccine currently available prevents 100% of severe COVID and death.   That's what really matters right?  I mean, we all get colds every year, but we don't go hide in our homes because of it.  If the vaccines reduce COVID to something that amounts to a cold, then problem solved.  

Why you ask should they be prioritized?   Because what's going on right now by keeping families apart is having very real and extremely detrimental impacts on people.  It's difficult to measure the impacts to families going through immigration and are apart because of the pandemic because we aren't actively looking at it, but they are there and they are hurting alot of people.   Don't underestimate the importance of family to personal health.   

Edited February 27, 2021 by GregandNatty

[Mike E 11,739]

2 minutes ago, GregandNatty said:

 

  I'm not saying we need to be at pre-covid levels, but maybe even 50% would be a reasonable place to be.  We aren't anywhere close to that. 
 

If I were in the foreign service, I’d refuse the order to endanger my life, especially in countries where the testing rates are a fraction of those in the USA.  

 

2 minutes ago, GregandNatty said:

Absolutely all of the science about the current vaccines say without exception that every vaccine currently available prevents 100% of severe COVID.  

 

 

And I 100 percent disagree.  Vaccines do not provide 100 percent protection from infection, period.  That is a scientific fact, backed by decades of data.    
 

 

2 minutes ago, GregandNatty said:

Why you ask should they be prioritized?   Because what's going on right now by keeping families apart is having very real and extremely detrimental impacts on people.

 

So you are putting the lives people who aren’t in the USA  ahead of mine?

 

No.   I am patiently waiting my turn for my vaccine.  They can wait their turn, even if that means USCIS workers have to wait in line with me with.  Most will be behind me, some ahead.  And that’s just fine.  
 

2 minutes ago, GregandNatty said:

It's difficult to measure the impacts to families that this pandemic has caused because we aren't actively looking at them, but they are there and they are hurting alot of people.   Don't underestimate the importance of family to personal health 

Yeah well things are tough all over.  

[GregandNatty 195]

2 minutes ago, Mike E said:

If I were in the foreign service, I’d refuse the order to endanger my life, especially in countries where the testing rates are a fraction of those in the USA.  

 

 

And I 100 percent disagree.  Vaccines do not provide 100 percent protection from infection, period.  That is a scientific fact, backed by decades of data.    
 

 

 

So you are putting the lives people who aren’t in the USA  ahead of mine?

 

No.   I am patiently waiting my turn for my vaccine.  They can wait their turn, even if that means USCIS workers have to wait in line with me with.  Most will be behind me, some ahead.  And that’s just fine.  
 

Yeah well things are tough all over.  

 

 

Let me take a wild guess here Mike:  You are here in the US with your significant other.   

 

Yes, things are tough all over.  2020 had been extremely difficult for everyone.  It's easier to go through adversity when you are with your significant other.  I will just leave it at that. 

I can understand and appreciate your viewpoint on both the vaccine and the current state of US immigration.   Quite frankly, I don't believe this forum is a venue to debate the COVID vaccines or government worker safety.  I've seen far too many threads on this forum over the last year descend into really toxic attacks when people start to go down these roads.  I'm not interested in these kinds of debates

I believe more can be done to fix what's going on with US Immigrations right now and this is why I started this thread.   I believe this is very important.  You can agree to disagree with me on this point and I'll respect your viewpoint. 

[Lemonslice 4,836]

Foreign services employees are not robots. What do you do with their families? 

It's more complicated logistically than getting a vaccine and putting them back to work.  Vaccines have limited availabilities, at this time.

 

Some employees also can't be in office (ex. No school or daycare available in their host countries) - and the employer (US government) has a duty of care while they're abroad.  

 

Good news, vaccine distribution is going to get smoother, and things should be normal-ish by summer/fall 2022 in most countries.  At least that's what the international organization I'm working for is projecting. 

 

Best of luck.

 

 

[GregandNatty 195]

16 minutes ago, Lemonslice said:

Foreign services employees are not robots. What do you do with their families? 

 

I work for/with government employees as a consultant and there is no question that federal employees are like 5 or 10 fold more paranoid about COVID than most private industry counterparts.  They are a mess across the board and they feed into their own mess by freaking each other out.    

 

What do you do with families?   I would counter with the question:  What do we do about medical professionals or school teachers families?    These professionals are being vaccinated and getting back to work. 

What's going on with US Immigrations and the family VISAs right now is just awful.   Somebody needs to address this before we address other parts of US Immigration like what's going on right now with our southern boarder and just letting thousands of asylum seekers come here while their cases are being processed.   That's cool but then let all of those with family visa applications bring their significant other, or which ever family member is part of the application, here to the US while their cases are being processed. 

Edited February 28, 2021 by GregandNatty

[Mike E 11,739]

Biden could ask for an appropriations bill to

 

* hire more workers to process visas and petitions.

 

* let petitioners and beneficiaries pay extra for premium processing as well as pay for premium courier services.  A good chunk the log jam is USCIS having to be reproduce cards and documents because USPS loses 

 

* let USPS hire more postal inspectors to investigate carriers are criminally negligent on misdelivery of critical documents 

 

* force SSA to accept copies of passports, green cards and EADs after being authenticated by private IRS acceptance agents who do this work world wide for ITINs
 

 

[GregandNatty 195]

3 minutes ago, Mike E said:

Biden could ask for an appropriations bill to

 

* hire more workers to process visas and petitions.

 

* let petitioners and beneficiaries pay extra for premium processing as well as pay for premium courier services.  A good chunk the log jam is USCIS having to be reproduce cards and documents because USPS loses 

 

* let USPS hire more postal inspectors to investigate carriers are criminally negligent on misdelivery of critical documents 

 

* force SSA to accept copies of passports, green cards and EADs after being authenticated by private IRS acceptance agents who do this work world wide for ITINs
 

 

 

I could get behind this. 

[Lemonslice 4,836]

5 minutes ago, GregandNatty said:

 

I work for/with government employees as a consultant and there is no question that federal employees are like 5 or 10 fold more paranoid about COVID than most private industry counterparts.  They are a mess across the board and they feed into their own mess by freaking each other out.    

 

What do you do with families?   I would counter with the question:  What do we do about medical professionals or school teachers families?    These professionals are being vaccinated and getting back to work. 

What's going on with US Immigrations and the family VISAs right now is just awful.   Somebody needs to address this before we address other parts of US Immigration like what's going on right now with our southern boarder and just letting thousands of asylum seekers come here while their cases are being processed.   That's cool but then let all of those with family visa applications bring their significant other, or which ever family member is part of the application, here to the US while their cases are being processed. 

I'm not arguing with you, I'm telling you that some things that are relatively easy to do in the USA, aren't that easy abroad.  Foreign services employees have to use local facilities for their children, for example. If teachers in Massachusetts won't be vaccinated for a little while, I can guess that isn't going to be sooner in Nairobi...

 

Even the "best" solutions will take time.  We're already ahead to what it could have been if no vaccines had been found yet.

 

Again, I wish you all the best.  Hopefully you'll be able to reunite/visit your spouse soon.

 

 

[GregandNatty 195]

25 minutes ago, Lemonslice said:

I'm not arguing with you, I'm telling you that some things that are relatively easy to do in the USA, aren't that easy abroad.  Foreign services employees have to use local facilities for their children, for example. If teachers in Massachusetts won't be vaccinated for a little while, I can guess that isn't going to be sooner in Nairobi...

 

I was out in Uganda over Christmas and COVID is almost a non-issue there.  I have a second home in Kampala.  Yes, people do wear masks in public, but literally everything is open. Honestly, I was a little freaked out when my wife was taking me into supermarkets loaded up with people shoulder to shoulder.   In fact, there was one supermarket we went to on Christmas eve and I told her I needed to go stand outside because I didn't want to catch COVID and be denied leaving Uganda since I had to have a negative PCR test to even board my flight home.

I bet the foreign service employees in Kenya are much more free to live a normal life than their counterparts here in the US.   I found my time in Uganda over Christmas a breath of fresh air in terms of getting away from what is going on here in the US with COVID restrictions. 

 

COVID is a non-issue in sub-saharan africa.  All of the statistics and numbers show this.  There is no reason Nairobi embassy couldn't be operating at almost full capacity.   I believe the issue is the system and not the situation. 

 

 

Edited February 28, 2021 by GregandNatty

[PatLuvO 284]

I agree with you on there needs to be more focus put on embassies and figuring out how they will get through the backlogs or coming up with other options. It's easy for people that aren't separated from their loved ones to say "oh be patient blah blah". I know Covid is real and I'm not saying any worker should put their life in danger but there has to be a safe way for visas to be processed. 

[retheem 564]

4 hours ago, GregandNatty said:

 

I think a phone call from Biden to the State Department could  fix the issue, but worse case an executive order that orders embassies to ramp up interviews would fix alot of this.    I'm not saying we need to be at pre-covid levels, but maybe even 50% would be a reasonable place to be.  We aren't anywhere close to that.   See attached.

The issue isn't the entire immigration system, but the people doing interviews.  Get these people vaccinated.  Absolutely all of the science about the current vaccines say without exception that every vaccine currently available prevents 100% of severe COVID and death.   That's what really matters right?  I mean, we all get colds every year, but we don't go hide in our homes because of it.  If the vaccines reduce COVID to something that amounts to a cold, then problem solved.  

Why you ask should they be prioritized?   Because what's going on right now by keeping families apart is having very real and extremely detrimental impacts on people.  It's difficult to measure the impacts to families going through immigration and are apart because of the pandemic because we aren't actively looking at it, but they are there and they are hurting alot of people.   Don't underestimate the importance of family to personal health.   

What sucks about the Nairobi Embassy is that they are even doing B1/B2s.

[GregandNatty 195]

26 minutes ago, retheem said:

What sucks about the Nairobi Embassy is that they are even doing B1/B2s.

 

Exactly right!  In January, Nairobi embassy issued 22 tourist VISAs and the same number of spouse VISAs.  Yet they are telling all of us they don't have the bandwidth for interviews.  It's BS.  

We need to all be contacting our congress representatives

[retheem 564]

3 minutes ago, GregandNatty said:

 

Exactly right!  In January, Nairobi embassy issued 22 tourist VISAs and the same number of spouse VISAs.  Yet they are telling all of us they don't have the bandwidth for interviews.  It's BS.  

We need to all be contacting our congress representatives

Hehe i know 2 people that were given B1/B2 on Tuesday only lol