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The G-28 Notice of Attorney Appearance in US Immigration Matters

Transcript of the above video:

In this video today, we are going to be discussing the form G-28. The G-28 is specifically a form that provides notice to the Department of Homeland Security’s United States Citizenship and Immigration Service, that an attorney is representing a client with respect to a pending matter before that body. Basically, these are forms that someone like me, I often have to fill them out and file them with respect to a visa case, where we have a client that is seeking a visa to the United States. It is something that should be noted is if you are not dealing with an individual that can file a form G-28, you may want to go ahead, especially if that individual is holding themselves out to be a licensed attorney or someone who is qualified to assist, I should specifically say to obtain remuneration for assisting, with US Immigration matters. If they can’t fill out a G-28 form, it is probably a good idea to go ahead and ascertain why that is. I am not going to get into details specific to that but it is probably not a bad idea to figure out why they are not able to file such a form if they are assisting people with these cases. So, I pulled this off the USCIS website directly; revised May 23, 2012. This specifically talks, this is from USCIS.gov. it specifically discusses matter pertaining to attorney representation and a form G-28.  I am just going to quote directly, a few, I think fairly relevant passages here. I will paraphrase it a little bit; there are some sections we are going to miss but I will just sum the key points. “An applicant or petitioner may be represented in matters filed with USCIS. Whenever an examination is provided for under the regulations, the person involved has a right to be represented by an attorney or represented before USCIS. Title 8 CFR-292.1 list the categories of individuals who may represent a person entitled to representation before DHS subject to   the limitations  in  8 CFR.283, an applicant or petitioner may be represented by an attorney in the United States, an attorney outside the United States, an accredited representative of a recognized organization. Only these categories of representatives may file a notice of appearance on Form G-28 or G-28I, an application or petition proceeding before USCIS”. Just quoting further - attorneys in the United States, “an attorney is any person who is eligible to practice law and a member in good standing of the Bar of the Highest Court of any State, possession, territory or commonwealth of the United States or of the District of Columbia and is not under any order of suspending, joining, restraining, disbarring or otherwise restricting him or her in the practice of law. An attorney may not be permitted to practice  in the state in which his or her office is located or where the applicant or petitioner resides and may have an office outside the United States as long as he or she is an attorney as defined in the regulations.” Just as a sort of a further commentary, because is mentions accredited representatives, to quote further, “an accredited representative is a person who represents an organization that has been recognized by the board of immigration appeals” and those are rather specific bodies I guess I should say, or organizations.  Things like Catholic charities, there are various non profit groups, non governmental organizations, NGOs that may have been approved by BIA for purposes of assisting people in these matters, but again, accredited representatives tend to not be folks who can accept, in fact I believe they cannot charge fees for assisting in matters pertaining to US Immigration and if I am wrong about that, it’s only on a limited scope. But that being said, just to put a fine point on it, those who are looking to undertake US Immigration to the United States, they can do it themselves, that’s certainly possible, but if you are looking to have professional assistance, you need to go ahead and hire a licensed attorney. You can ascertain that attorney’s credentials by asking them directly “what are your credentials?” and you can see the credentials as mentioned in there, you know: a license, a bar card, basically a license showing admission to the Bar, the highest court of a given state, commonwealth, etc. So, these are basically the things associated with the G-28. Once an attorney has become an attorney of record in immigration proceedings, they are going to go ahead,  and a big one is to be copied in to the various correspondence associated with the case so they can deal with things in a timely manner on behalf of their client.

So basically to sum up this video and the thing to take away, the G-28 is basically a form that is associated with attorney representation in the United States, I shouldn’t say United States, attorney representation before the various agencies associated with the US visa and the Immigration process. Those who are unable to produce some sort of licensure to practice law in one of the 50 states or one of the jurisdictions of the United States, basically pursuant to the laws noted in 292.1, it can basically be inferred that those individuals can’t charge fees for assisting people in immigration matters. So to sum this thing up, the G-28, it’s an important document. It places the government on notice that an individual or individuals or company, have retained an attorney and have representation in an immigration matter and that attorney will be copied in and can act as a liaison, act as a representative as the case progresses.