This is not legal advice. Contact a qualified immigration lawyer to discuss your particular situation.
In deciding whether to apply to be a potential plaintiff in the AILF class-action suit to be filed against the USCIS and Department of State over the July Visa Bulletin fiasco, many understandably want to know what is the downside to being a named plaintiff in the lawsuit.
In reviewing the FAQs published by AILF, the only issues I see are: (1) plaintiffs’ names are public information (although there will likely be hundreds, maybe thousands of plaintiffs); (2) plaintiffs cases MAY be subject to greater scrutiny when being adjudicated (although retaliation by the government because you participated in the suit is unlawful and unlikely to occur); (3) plaintiffs may be called by the government to answer questions relating to the suit either in person or in writing and plaintiffs would be responsible for their transportation costs, this too is a very unlikely scenario; and (4) if a class is certified by the court, then those who would have been eligible to be plaintiffs in the lawsuit, even if they were not named plaintiffs, would be entitled to the same relief as the named plaintiffs.
We will be mailing and e-mailing FAQs, questionnaires and Retainer Agreements to our eligible clients today. Contact your immigration lawyer if you would like to participate in the suit or contact AILF directly at: visabulletin@ailf.org.
