Frequently asked questions

Mandamus is a lawsuit in federal court that asks a judge to make an agency — usually USCIS, sometimes the State Department — do a duty it already has: decide your application. Not approve it; decide it. Its legal footing is the Administrative Procedure Act: an agency that owes you a decision owes it within a reasonable time. Because the court is never asked to judge the merits, the only real question is whether the wait itself has become unreasonable — and that is a question the review can answer before you spend anything.

From the case tracker, you can't — both show "pending" for months. The tells are in the file and the timeline: how far past posted times you are, whether an interview or RFE ever happened, and what USCIS asked for last. That is what the review looks at. Because we draft these petitions ourselves, we know what an officer would trip over, and we tell you plainly if something needs fixing before anyone files anything. The long version, with five tells.

Yes — that is the practice. Clinch Law Firm files family, employment, and naturalization cases day to day, and takes the agency to federal court when one stalls past reason. If we filed your petition, the review starts from a file we already know. If someone else did, we review it the same way and work alongside your existing lawyer if you have one.

We tell you — before anything is filed. That is the "fix first" answer: a missing or expired document, an issue USCIS flagged and nobody answered, a petition that needs a supplement. We quote the fix as its own flat piece of work, do it, and then decide together whether a lawsuit is still needed. A lawsuit filed over a broken file just delivers the problem to an officer faster. What we look for, in detail.

Offices, not people: the officials who head USCIS and the Department of Homeland Security, and the Secretary of State when a consulate is involved — each in an official capacity. No officer is named and no one is personally liable. On the government side the case lands with an Assistant U.S. Attorney who handles many of these; the officer who eventually decides your application is applying the same law to the same file either way.

No. The application is decided on the same law and the same file whether or not a lawsuit made the agency pick it up; in our mandamus cases we have not seen a denial we could trace to the lawsuit. What changes is accountability — after filing, a government attorney owes a federal judge an answer about your case. The honest caveat: if the file has a problem, a lawsuit surfaces it sooner. That is exactly why the review checks the file before recommending a filing.

Both. In practice the complaint pleads two things together: the Administrative Procedure Act, which lets a court compel action an agency has "unreasonably delayed" (the statute's own words), and the Mandamus Act, which lets it order an official to perform a clear duty. Courts treat them as asking for the same relief, and the word most people use for the whole thing is "mandamus." The label changes nothing about your cost, your timeline, or what you have to do.

There is no statutory deadline, so the question is whether a judge would find your wait unreasonable for your case type. The benchmarks we use: marriage cases and most N-400s past about 12 months; N-400s 120 days past the interview; 221(g) administrative processing past about 6 months; asylum interviews past roughly five years; work-permit renewals past posted times or an expired card; EB-5 petitions past a year. Employment cases: about 12 months once a visa number is available. Our 60-second pre-assessment runs these; the review confirms them against your actual file. Run it here.

Yes — in your favor. A separate statute, 8 U.S.C. § 1447(b), applies when your interview is more than 120 days behind you and USCIS still has not ruled: the application can be brought before a federal district court, which may rule on it directly or return it to USCIS with a deadline attached. Pre-interview delays are ordinary mandamus questions; post-interview delays have this firmer clock. A cancelled or postponed oath ceremony after an approved interview is in the same territory. How the 120-day rule works.

Usually, yes — and we will say so. A lawsuit filed inside the posted processing time spends your money to move a file that is already in the queue, and a judge will not call a normal wait unreasonable. The "wait" answer comes with a date to come back and a short list of things that would change it sooner: an expired work permit, a family separation with a hard deadline, a job offer about to lapse. If one of those is your situation, say so in the form.

Yes. Mandamus and consular cases are filed in U.S. federal court regardless of where you live, and the work happens on paper — no U.S. address, trip, or courtroom appearance is required. Applicants waiting abroad on I-130 approvals, NVC scheduling, and 221(g) administrative processing are a large part of the practice. Reviews, documents, and updates run over email and WhatsApp, in English or Turkish. What to do from Türkiye while you wait.

It depends on what is pending. A mandamus lawsuit is about an application the agency owes a decision on; if you have one — an adjustment, a waiver, an asylum case — being out of status does not by itself stop you from asking a court to compel a decision. What it does change is the risk analysis, because a decision can be a denial. That is a conversation for the review, not the form: tell us the facts and you will get a straight answer about whether filing helps or hurts.

Not always. An I-140 belongs to the employer as much as to you, so in employment cases the company is often a plaintiff — sometimes the only one needed. Family petitioners and EB-5 investors can likewise bring the case with or alongside the beneficiary. Who files is a strategic choice about standing and venue that we make in the review; it does not change the fee.

Service starts a 60-day clock for the government's answer. In our experience most applications are decided within 30–60 days of filing — the agency would rather adjudicate than defend the delay. Some take longer: the government may request an extension or file a motion, and the case proceeds on the court's schedule. Either way, you are never back in the silence you started from; every step has a date and we explain it as it happens.

Almost never. Mandamus cases are decided on papers — the complaint, the government's response, and any motions — and the usual outcome is that the agency acts before a hearing is ever needed. You will not be asked to testify. We handle every filing and every conversation with the U.S. Attorney's office, and we tell you what each step means as it happens. You can technically file without a lawyer; the cost of a procedural mistake in federal court is why almost nobody should.

Less than you expect. Your receipt notices (I-797), any USCIS or consular correspondence — including 221(g) slips and RFEs — a list of the inquiries you have made and when, and your identity documents. If someone else filed the petition, a copy of what was filed helps the "stuck or broken" question enormously. Send what you have; we tell you what else matters after the review.

No. The practice is federal: clients in all fifty states and applicants abroad. The office is in McKinney, Texas; the court is wherever venue is proper for your case, and you do not appear in it. Everything — the review, documents, updates — runs remotely, in English or Turkish.

Yes. Mandamus is federal litigation, and many immigration lawyers refer it out. We can take only the lawsuit and coordinate with your existing lawyer on the underlying case, or — if you prefer — review the whole file. What we will not do is second-guess your lawyer to win the work: if the file is sound and the delay is the only problem, that is what we will tell you.

You can, and the fact that you tried is useful evidence that the delay is not for lack of asking. But they are not required before filing, and in cases that are genuinely stuck they rarely move anything. If you have already done them, bring the responses. If you have not, do not spend months on them before finding out whether your wait is already past the benchmark.

Two parts: the federal court filing fee, which is the same nationwide, and a flat attorney fee for the mandamus case, quoted in writing before you decide. No hourly billing, no surprise invoices, and the review itself is free. If the answer is "fix first," the fix is quoted separately as its own piece of work; if the answer is "wait," you owe nothing.

It depends on what is wrong, and you will know the number before we do anything. A supplement to a pending petition, a replacement document, or a response to an open request is quoted as a flat fee for that task. If the case then still needs a lawsuit, the mandamus fee is quoted on top — never folded in, never a surprise. Many "fix first" cases never need the lawsuit at all.

It is movement — an officer has opened your file, which is exactly what the lawsuit was for. It is not yet a decision. We respond to the request, and the case usually stays open until USCIS decides, so the deadline pressure does not go away while you answer. If the RFE points at something in the file we would have flagged in the review, this is where having the petition lawyers and the litigators under one roof pays off. What happens to the lawsuit while you answer.

It happens in a minority of cases: instead of deciding, the government's lawyers move to dismiss or request more time. Then the case proceeds like any federal civil matter — we respond, the court rules, and the schedule is the judge's, not the agency's. Your flat fee does not change because the government chose to argue. And even a contested case has something the waiting never did: dates.

It means the agency did the thing the lawsuit asked for: scheduled the interview, issued the decision, printed the visa. The lawsuit gets you a decision; it has no say in what the decision is. Most decisions on clean files are approvals, which is why the review checks the file first — if there is a reason to expect a denial, you should know it before filing, not after.