DHS published a correcting amendment in the Federal Register on September 16, 2026 fixing a drafting error in the interim final rule it issued a week earlier on children born in the United States to foreign government employees. The error was not cosmetic: the September 9 rule inadvertently deleted the list of documents such a child must file to register for permanent residence, leaving that requirement blank in the Code of Federal Regulations for a week.
The underlying interim final rule (RIN 1615-AD24, 91 FR 57249) implements Executive Order 14418 and sets the terms on which children born in the US to non-citizen “foreign government employees” register for lawful permanent residence under 8 CFR 101.3. In reformatting the regulatory text at 8 CFR 264.2, DHS meant to revise only the introductory language of paragraph (c)(2) while keeping the subparagraphs beneath it. As the agency now concedes, “the amendatory instructions did not make that clear and the CFR was codified by removing the sub paragraphs that contained evidentiary criteria.”
Today’s amendment restores the full filing list: Form I-485 with the fee and required initial evidence, Form G-325A, the applicant’s birth certificate, an executed Form I-508 waiver where applicable, official confirmation of the parent’s foreign government employment, a list of all arrivals in and departures from the United States, proof of continuous residence, and two photographs.
Two of those items also changed substance, whatever the label on the document says. DHS revised paragraphs (c)(2)(v) and (vi) to recognize that children whose parents were foreign government employees but not foreign diplomatic officers may not be required to file Form I-508, Waiver of Rights, Privileges, Exemptions, and Immunities — and that they must submit evidence of the parent’s employment rather than the parent’s diplomatic classification. That is a meaningfully lighter burden for the larger group of applicants whose parents held ordinary foreign government jobs rather than diplomatic rank. DHS characterizes the change as already reflected in the Form I-485 information collection approved alongside the interim rule, which is also why an unusual 09/04/26 edition of Form I-485 has been circulating ahead of the separate 09/18/26 public-charge edition.
The correction is effective September 16 but applicable as of September 4, 2026 — the interim rule’s own effective date — so DHS is treating it as though the restored text had been there all along. The agency waived notice and comment under the Administrative Procedure Act’s good-cause exception, reasoning that the fix “corrects a technical error in the regulatory text and does not make substantive changes to the policies in the IFR.”
For affected families, the practical guidance is simple: file against the corrected regulation and the current I-485 edition, and if a parent was a foreign government employee without diplomatic status, confirm whether the I-508 waiver is required at all before signing one.
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Source: Federal Register (DHS/USCIS)