With Federal Judge Andrew Hanen’s deadline to return incorrectly issued 3-year Employment Authorization Documents (EADs) quickly approaching, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has informed the public that it will be conducting home visits to retrieve affected EADs. During a July 14 stakeholder call, USCIS announced some important updates to this initiative:

  1. USCIS home visits to collect affected EADs will start on Thursday, July 16 (rather than July 15 as original indicated by USCIS).
  2. USCIS will conduct a “pilot” program in Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, Dallas, and potentially San Francisco. USCIS will then expand the pilot program geographically sometime next week. Expansion will likely take place in zip code areas with large concentrations of recipients and areas not in close proximity to a USCIS field office.
  3. DACA recipients who return their EADs during a home visit will receive a USCIS receipt as proof of compliance.
  4. DACA recipients can also return their EADs at any USCIS field office and receive a USCIS receipt to evidence compliance.
  5. Any DACA recipient who is not at home when USCIS visits will not receive written notice of USCIS’ visit.
  6. Should a recipient fail to return the 3-year EAD by the July 17 deadline, letters including notice of USCIS’ intention to terminate DACA will be sent to the DACA recipient and the attorney of record, if applicable.

Bottom line: should you hold an affected DACA EAD that is being recalled by USCIS, you must return it the agency before the July 17 deadline in one of the ways outlined above. Failure to do so could adversely affect your future ability to secure an immigration benefit.

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Photo of Ian Macdonald Ian Macdonald

Ian R. Macdonald Co-Chairs the firm’s Labor & Employment Practice’s International Employment, Immigration & Workforce Strategies group. He focuses his practice on developing, assessing and managing global mobility programs for multinational companies on a range of challenges affecting the movement of people capital

Ian R. Macdonald Co-Chairs the firm’s Labor & Employment Practice’s International Employment, Immigration & Workforce Strategies group. He focuses his practice on developing, assessing and managing global mobility programs for multinational companies on a range of challenges affecting the movement of people capital domestically and internationally, including secondment agreements, benefits transferability, local host country employment concerns and immigration.

Ian and his team work closely with companies to manage and modify, where needed, corporate immigration programs to maximize efficiency, service and regulatory compliance levels. He is experienced with the full range of business immigration sponsorship categories (visas and permanent residence), anti-discrimination rules to reduce or eliminate risk of employment litigation, employer sanction cases, and I-9 and E-Verify compliance. Ian assists clients with establishing risk-based performance standards (RBPS) and Department of Homeland Security protocol, providing risk assessment assistance to corporations subject to Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) and assisting clients with ITAR/Export Control compliance within the immigration context.

Ian has developed strategic relationships abroad that he utilizes when working with clients to ensure compliance with foreign registration requirements. He is experienced with analyzing complex global mobility opportunities on country-specific matters to facilitate the transfer of personnel. Ian is also experienced in counseling employers on immigration strategy as well as immigration consequences of mergers and acquisitions, reduction in workforces, and furloughs.

Prior to joining the firm, Ian worked for the United Nations, various non-governmental think tanks and corporate law firms in London, Washington, D.C., New York and Atlanta.