Dear Fellow Fee Fighters:

We wanted to provide an update on the USCIS fee hike campaign and a helpful chart summarizing the new changes. Thanks for all your previous support, and we are looking forward to working with genealogists and records access advocates moving forward to demand the transfer of USCIS’ historical documents to the National Archives, where they belong.

USCIS announced their final fee rule this past Monday. Records Not Revenue is dismayed at the astronomical fee hikes that will be imposed by USCIS for obtaining copies of historical records via the USCIS Genealogy Program. Many of the records held by the USCIS Genealogy Program should already be available at the National Archives, and we call upon USCIS and NARA to create and make public a plan to transfer the historical records and their associated indices, as soon as possible.

As of October 2, 2020, researchers will pay a minimum of $160 to initiate a records request, and pay up to $415 total to obtain certain historical records. USCIS will also impose additional fees if the requests are made by mail. There may also be additional fees to repay Congress, in the event of a bailout.

You can view the final rule in its entirety on the Federal Register at: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/08/03/2020-16389/us-citizenship-and-immigration-services-fee-schedule-and-changes-to-certain-other-immigration.

In the coming days, Records Not Revenue will update its website with additional information on fees, how all the different permutations of fees will impact researchers, and HOW YOU CAN HELP. Stay tuned.

–Records Not Revenue

https://www.recordsnotrevenue.com/