Key Takeaways Facebook Live with Deputy Roland Lescure and French Morning

Key takeaways from deputy Roland Lescure, Member of the French National Assembly and Representative of French Residents Overseas, President of the Economic Affairs Commission.

View the video playback on the Facebook page of French Morning.

1. For the most up to date information: subscribe to Deputy Lescure’s newsletter here. For guidance on specific visa situations, contact your local embassy or consulate. Roland Lescure and his staff can be reached at roland.lescure@assemblee-nationale.fr. Please note they are receiving high volumes of inquiries and doing their best to respond.

2. Many audience questions on a common theme: travel, including travel schedules and the right to exit, enter and re-enter territories both to and from France. Deputy Lescure advises you to stay at your current permanent residence. Students and short-stay visas are advised to consider returning home early. Limit all travel to essential or emergencies, all leisure and business travel should cease. When possible, book flights directly with the airline for most up to date schedules and cancellation notices if any. Orly airport in Paris will be closing next week due to low flight frequency and the need to store grounded aircrafts. Air France, KLM and other airlines are maintaining 2-3 weekly routes between major U.S. cities.​

3. Prolongment of visas: for ESTA and all categories (L, E etc.) delays could be longer than normal. Duputy Lescure does not advise to overstay and no announcement has been made at this time by U.S. services to prolong any specific category. Canadian authorities may advise in the coming days.

To the contrary, France has automatically prolonged by 3 months all long-stay and titres de sejour, temporary authorizations, asylum request attestations and receipts of titre de sejour request (local Prefecture.

4. Assistance for French employees and businesses in the United States. Is there any aid available for them? The economic activity of a person is linked to their residency. When we live in the United States, “we live with the best of America and the less good aspects, both in terms of economic development, taxes, social protections and infrastructure. And when we live in France, whether we are French or American, we live with the best and less good aspects of France.”

A plan was voted in the assembly this past weekend. Among the measures, the 3-month waiting time to benefit from social security after a repatriation has been suspended during the period of the pandemic.

America is voting on its own economic stimulus package in the coming days. The total cost is incomparable due to the size of the economy and population of each country and taking into account the existing social measures in France that do not have an American equivalent.

5. Public Charge ruling in the United States initiated by the Trump administration (entered into effect February 24^th) - can requesting unemployment assistance during the COVID-19 pandemic be negatively counted towards future immigration requests? In principal, unlike SNAP or WIC, this category of assistance, like food banks and food pantries, does not seem to be considered. Unemployment benefits are acquired by your right to work and not public assistance benefits. However certain visa categories are linked to work, and losing the right to work, would also mean losing benefits. Considered individuals should consult their immigration attorney. More information is available in the recent French Morning article.