Hi, I'm Hilary Walsh, a serial entrepreneur, award-winning immigration lawyer, law professor, TEDx speaker, and Raven Phoenix Suns fan. Over the past decade, I've helped thousands of immigrants live free in the United States. I'm talking work permits, social security numbers, green cards, their citizenship, VAWA, TV visa, U visa, and lots of successful appeals. Here's the thing, immigration law is super complicated and legal advice, well, it can be
pretty expensive. So I created the immigration law made easy podcast to share my 10 plus years of experience with you for free. So if you're looking for tried and true, no BS, step-by-step strategies and tips on how to win your immigration case and live truly free in the United States, you're in the right place, my friend. Let's get started. Hello, my friend. Today, I want to talk to you about the difference between a 601A provisional
waiver and a regular old 601 waiver. Hi, I'm Hilary. I'm an immigration attorney and the founder of New Frontier immigration law where we help immigrants live free and without fear. I'm not going to lie. When I was first starting out as an immigration lawyer, I did so much Google lawyering to try to figure out what the heck these immigration law terms were and why each form was necessary for each different thing, even though they looked like they were like for the same purpose.
And it kind of made me want to pull my hair out. So this podcast, if you can relate where you're looking through and you're like, why is this so difficult? Why is this so confusing? What do each of these things mean? This podcast is going to help you with that. I have done the research, I've done the cases, I have gotten the approvals. We have 100% success rate for 601s and for 601As.
So I know now what I needed to know and I'm going to teach you so that if you are like I used to be in a little bit confused and a little bit frustrated and you didn't know of a credible source to go to to learn the information if I got you. So let's start with the very first place we have to start when we assess what type of waiver do I need to file? Like, let's pretend you know you need a waiver. What type do I need to file? The first question you have to ask yourself is, where's my client?
Or if it's if it's for you or your family member, you have to ask, where am I? Where is the immigrant? If the immigrant is in their home country, let's use Mexico as an example. Most of my clients are Mexican. We specialize in helping Mexicans and Central Americans. We'll help anybody, of course, we can help you. But those are the cases that we do a lot because we are next door neighbors with our amazing Mexican friends, okay, here in Arizona. Where is my client? Where is the immigrant? If
they're located in Mexico, you don't need to file a 601A, the YND. And you'll figure out here in a few minutes why I'm saying that. You would have to file a 601 assuming that that's the type of waiver that you need to fix your client or your family members or your own issue with admissibility. If by contrast, your client or the immigrant, you are in the US as a whole other ballgame, you might need both a 601 and a 601A. The next question you ask yourself is, what process am I
doing? Is the process I'm doing to get a green card going to take me to my home country? In this situation is that my process, consular processing, in which case I will eventually go to CU.Johara's for my interview. If the answer is yes to both of those things, one, I'm in the US right now, my client is in the US right now. And two, he or she is eventually going to go to Mexico. Or let's use this example for you as the immigrant petitioning for yourself, getting your own stuff sorted out.
I'm in the US and I know I need to go to Mexico to CU.Johara's to get my papers fixed. The next question you ask is, what am I trying to get waived? What am I trying to get forgiven or pardoned? If the answer is yes, I'm in the US. Yes, I need to go to my home country to fix my status because I'm doing a process called consular processing. And the third question, the third answer to the question is, yes, I need to get my unlawful presence waived. I've been here for more than
180 days without permission and I'm over the age of 17. I need to do what's called a 601A, Provisional Unlawful Presence Waiver, before I leave. If by contrast, you have a fraud and misrepresentation issue and you got to go to CU.Johara's to fix, you got to do that waiver when you're in Mexico. You can't do it before you leave under most circumstances, not every circumstance but most circumstances. Okay, so let's put some legs on this by using example.
Sarah came to the United States when she was, she's Mexican. She came to the United States when she was 15 years old. She came without permission. Okay, these are made up facts. This is not a real case. Okay. Sarah came to the US without permission when she was 15. She's 22 years old now and she's married to a US citizen. So she wants to get her green card through her marriage to her partner, okay, to her spouse. Because Sarah is currently in the United States,
question one, she needs to go to CU.Johara's to fix question two. And she's been in the US for more than 179 days and she's over the age of 18. Question number three, we know she has a lawful presence issue and the US government will allow her to file that waiver now and wait it out while she's in the US before leaving and actually going to her appointment. That's called a 601A, Provisional Unlawful Presence Waiver. Let's break down what those terms mean because I think that's
really helpful. It all makes sense for me. Sometimes I feel like in immigration law, it's English, but I don't understand what the words mean. It's like, I know you're speaking English, but what does this even mean? I feel that way when I speak. Sometimes here's Spanish too, but that's also because I don't really speak Spanish very well. Truth be told. Okay, so let's
break down the weird English of immigration law. Provisional means we're giving you this provision, we're giving you this benefit, we're giving you this extra allowance to allow you to file your waiver in the US and wait it out while you're here. The reason this is an allowance, this is a provision, this is a perk, a treat if you will, whatever, is because most other waivers, you
have to file in your home country and you have to wait there for them to be adjudicated. The real benefit of a provisional unlawful presence waiver is right now they take almost four years to get an approval for. So if you had to file that while you were in Mexico, you would be waiting a very, very long time. And in fact, you wouldn't file a 601A, you would file a 601, but you'd be
waiting for a very long time. So the nice thing is we're not like the US government has said, we're going to give you this allowance, this provision to allow you to file the waiver here in the US, wait it out while all those years while it's being adjudicated, you can wait here, continue on with life, you're with your spouse, possibly with your kids, live in your life. And then once it's approved, we can continue the process with the consulate. But if it's not approved,
no harm, no foul, you just withdraw your application for the green card. Okay, so that's the provisional waiver. If however, let's use a different example, because Sarah obviously in this circumstance, Sarah needs an unlawful presence waiver, she would file the 601A before she went to her interview in C.J. Horace, okay, that's the 601A waiver. She's in the US, she needs to leave to fix her status. And she has an unlawful presence bar that she needs to have waived. Okay.
Next up, let's pretend Sarah, let's use a different name, let's use Maria. Maria is from Mexico. Similar to Sarah, she entered when she was 15. She has DACA. Okay, she got DACA when she was 18, and has always had DACA, her whole life, she's never had any laughs in DACA. She wants to go to C.J. Horace to fix because now she's married to a US citizen, and through their marriage, she wants to get her green card. Wonderful. Sarah's, sorry, Maria is
in the US. She wants to go to Mexico to fix, she needs to go to Mexico to fix through C.J. Horace. And then the next question is, has she been here unlawfully for more than 179 days after the age of 18? And in this situation, it sounds like no, because she's always had DACA. So she's not been accruing unlawful presence. So she would not actually need a 601A waiver in order to leave.
So she would not need to file the waiver. That's awesome. She may have other issues. Maria may have other issues, like a fraud and misrepresentation or alien smuggling or something else, that could be a separate issue, but she won't need a 601A waiver. Okay, she doesn't have an unlawful presence bar. And that's the only thing that a 601A can help you cure that can help you forgive, to pardon, to fix is the unlawful presence bar. Okay. Let me give you a third example.
Let me use a male name, Raul. So random, the names that come to mind, but Raul is Mexican. He entered the United States without permission. When he was, let's change this actually, he entered with Avisa when he was four, his parents brought him to the US. He had Avisa. He entered when he was four. He's been here ever since, has never left. He's married to a US citizen now and wants to get his green card. So Raul's in the United States. He wants to go to see you. Horas.
He's being told to go to see you. Horas to fix. And yes, he would need, he's been here for more than 180 days, 179 days after the age of 18. In this situation, Raul doesn't have DACA. I would say pump the brakes, hold up. Why is Raul leaving the country when he could adjust status here in the US and he won't need a waiver for his unlawful presence because he's not going to leave triggering the 10 year bar. So he doesn't have an unlawful presence bar issue until he leaves.
So why don't we just file for an adjustment of status for him? So I would say, hey, Raul, pump the brakes. Let's look to see if you even need to go to see you. Horas. Why don't we just get you your status fixed here? In which case you will not need to go to see you. Horas. So you really don't get past point two and therefore will not need a 601A waiver. Whoa, this is getting
complicated. You can see why, why when I was a young lawyer, my head was spinning because even as I explain this and try to make it super simple, my brain gets twisted into little pretzels as well. So if that's happening for you, it's okay. We'll, we'll slow it down. Let's do another example. Okay. If, um, let's use Samantha. Samantha is in Mexico. She's married to us at US citizen. Samantha, um, was in the US for a while, but ended up going back to Mexico four or five years ago because she
needed to see her mom. She left on her own, uh, need. She wasn't deported or ordered, removed or anything, but Samantha had unlawfully been in the US for a really long time and she left because she needed to go see her mom. Her mom was not well. So now they're going through the immigration process where her husband is petitioning for her, her husband's a US citizen. What do we do to Sam? Does Samantha need a 601 waiver or a 601A waiver?
Where's the client at? Where is the immigrant at? If they're in their own country, stop. You do not need a 601A waiver. You only need a 601A waiver if they're in the United States when they're filing for their green card in another, going through the process in another, their home country. Consular processing is what that's called. Okay. So in this situation, so in this situation, Samantha's already in Mexico, so we don't need to file a 601A.
We don't need the provision of allowing her to be in the US while the waiver is being adjudicated. She's already left. So instead, what we would do is we would file for her green card and then the consul's going to tell her, you need to file a 601 waiver for, or you got to wait out the, the 10 years and we would say, Hey, we're going to file a waiver so that we don't have to wait
the 10 years based on her US citizen spouse. Okay. So the big difference, and we're going to close this episode out is where's the person at and what are you trying to have waived? If the person's in the US and they're trying to waive on lawful presence when they go to another country, you can file a 601A. If they're trying to waive previously being deported or having a fraud and misrepresentation issue and they're trying to go to another country in order
to fix, you don't, that's not what the 601A is for. Okay. And if they're already in their home country, you don't need a 601A. Don't even be messing around with that nonsense. You need a 601 for the most part. I'm going to end this podcast, this episode by saying, I'm not talking to you about your specific case, even if your, your facts are super simple to the examples I use, Sarah, Maria, Raul, or even Samantha today. Any of those situations, that's great. I'm glad that
they're similar, but they're not your case. Please contact an experienced immigration lawyer. I've been doing only immigration for over 10 years and I would love to help you be able to kind of sort through this and know exactly what it is that you need. And again, we have a hundred percent success rate on waivers because I love doing these waivers. I love rocking out. So even if you feel like, I don't know how to establish hardship, I don't think that there's hardship there.
Don't give up hope. Hardship exists all around us. We live in 2024, hardship exists all around us. We even offer a money back guarantee where if we don't win your waiver, we give you your money back for 601A waivers because we are that confident that we can help you. So contact me at New Frontier Immigration Law if you want this done and done the right way. And if you're a lawyer listening to this, keep up the good fight. Reach out to me if you have any other questions. I'm here to help,
and I want to help change a million lives. And that includes helping educate attorneys so that you can go out and help your clients as well. Have a great day, friends. My friend, I'm so glad you joined me today. If you have a friend or family member who may need some immigration law guidance or even just day-to-day encouragement, please send them a text or email
or a DM on social media and say, Hey, I think this podcast is going to help you. I sure wish someone had given me the tips I'm sharing here years and years ago when I was starting out as an immigration lawyer. Thank you so much for being here. I'll see you next week. Same time, same place. Adios.