Green Card Seekers Must Leave U.S. to Apply, Trump Administration Says
“The Trump administration announced that most foreigners seeking green cards must return to their home countries to apply, a change that could affect hundreds of thousands of people. This policy, which requires consular processing outside the U.S., could lead to family separations and longer processing times. While the administration claims this change will reduce illegal immigration, it has been met with confusion and concern from immigration lawyers and advocates.
The change is likely to affect hundreds of thousands of people. It could also lead to more family separations as spouses or relatives wait for application decisions, immigration lawyers said.
The Trump administration said on Friday that most foreigners seeking green cards will have to return to their home countries to apply, a remarkable change that could make it more difficult for hundreds of thousands of people to obtain permanent residency.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency that oversees the legal immigration system, said it would grant green cards to people inside the country only in “extraordinary circumstances.” People applying for permanent residency, which is one step away from citizenship, will have to go through consular processing outside the country instead, according to a memo issued by the agency.
“This policy allows our immigration system to function as the law intended instead of incentivizing loopholes,” Zach Kahler, a spokesman for the agency, said in a statement. “When aliens apply from their home country, it reduces the need to find and remove those who decide to slip into the shadows and remain in the U.S. illegally after being denied residency.”
The change could upend the lives of people who entered the country lawfully through temporary visas and are seeking green cards to remain in the United States, including students, spouses of U.S. citizens and a wide range of foreign workers. The process of obtaining a green card — which gives immigrants the right to live in the country permanently and provides a path to citizenship — takes months or longer, meaning families could be separated for extended periods.
The memo was immediately met with confusion and chaos as immigration lawyers scrambled to understand which exceptions would be granted. Many also expected the policy change to be met with legal challenges.
The agency did not detail which groups would be eligible for an exception, only suggesting that refugees would not be subject. Mr. Kahler said in a statement that people who “provide an economic benefit or otherwise are in the national interest will likely be able to continue on their current path.”
It was unclear, though, which foreign workers would be exempt and if exceptions would extend to skilled foreign workers on H-1B visas, for instance.
The policy is a major escalation of the Trump administration’s efforts to curb legal immigration and reflects how the president’s crackdown has broadened beyond immigrants living in the country unlawfully. Federal officials have in recent months sought to strip some naturalized citizens of their status and review thousands of green card holders to root out immigrants they believe should be deported.
The change is likely to lead to more families being separated as spouses or relatives wait for decisions on their applications, immigration lawyers and former homeland security officials said. It could also lead to longer processing times as consulates around the world manage an influx of new cases.
“Our consular processing system through which they would have to apply is already overburdened,” said Sarah Pierce, a former policy analyst at Citizenship and Immigration Services who is now the director of social policy at the center-left think tank Third Way. “So that means we could have families separated for months or years.”
About 1.4 million green cards were granted in 2024, with more than 820,000 approved for people inside the country through a process called “adjustment of status,” according to Department of Homeland Security data. Over the past two decades, more than 500,000 people have received green cards via adjustment of status each year, except for in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Most green cards issued in the last 10 years were to people already in the country
The majority of people who became legal permanent residents while in the U.S. were sponsored by a relative or an employer.
Number of green cards issued each fiscal year
There are various pathways for foreigners to obtain a green card. People with temporary visas can apply to adjust their status if they have spouses who are U.S. citizens, for instance. Certain foreign workers and parents of citizens who are at least 21 years old are also eligible for green cards.
More than 70 percent of people who received a green card through marriage did so through adjustment of status, totaling about 250,000 people in 2024.
Some immigration attorneys said they were inundated with calls and emails from clients on Friday asking how the new memo could affect their cases.
Robert O’Malley, an immigration attorney in Grand Rapids, Mich., said several clients called to ask if their spouses needed to leave the United States, or if they would be able to stay together.
“I’ve done my best to assuage those fears,” Mr. O’Malley said. “But I’m really just trying to digest this six-page memo and wait for further guidance so that we know how to best advise our clients.”
Madeleine Ngo covers immigration and economic policy for The Times.
Albert Sun is a data reporter and graphics editor at The Times who covers immigration.“
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