Brazil's Musical Grande Dame BIBI FERREIRA Returns to New York to Debut 4 x Bibi;   Performing September 20 and 23 at Symphony Space, Bibi's New Show Salutes Four of Her Singing Peers: Frank Sinatra, Édith Piaf, Carlos Gardel and Amália Rodrigues;   At Age 94, a Living Legend Whose Fans Include Maria Bethania and Liza Minnelli Bibi Ferreira is Brazilian musical and theatrical royalty. As a singer, actress, and director, Ferreira-now 94-has influenced generations of Brazilian greats, including the country's fabled mythic diva, Maria Bethânia. "Everything that she does has helped Brazil with its identity," Bethânia told NPR's Weekend Edition.   Her first appearance on stage was in a play put on by the company of her godmother Abigail Maia. When a prop doll could not be found, and the curtain was about to go up, in panic someone suggested Procopio's baby daughter, who was in his dressing room. Bibi Ferreira, 24 days old, entered the stage in the arms of Abigail Maia, the leading actress after whom she was named.   Ferreira studied piano and violin, wrote music and also had an interest in design and painting. But then, in 1941, her father offered her a role in La Locandiera (The Mistress of the Inn) by Carlo Goldoni. She was 18, and never looked back.   Bibi Ferreira was in her father's company for two years before, at 21, organizing her own comedy company. From that point on, her passion for music and theater took her on a remarkable path that includes productions of My Fair Lady, in which she played Eliza Doolitle, and Man of La Mancha (she was the first director to stage such productions in Brazil), to revues, TV specials and orchestral shows. She starred and produced music shows such as Bibi conta e canta Piaf (Bibi Speaks and Sings Piaf) and worked with some of the best artists in Brazilian popular music, including Elizeth Cardoso, Clara Nunes, Maria Bethania and Baden Powell.   Ater 75 years on stage, Ferreira says in the days leading up to a concert, she doesn't talk so as to preserve her voice. Before stepping on stage, she downs a shot of expresso "with a a dollop of butter, for the throat," and, even after all these years, she worries to the point of trembling. "I'm afraid that my voice might waver, might not be as strong," she says. "Every performance is a challenge. Each song has its own difficulties and you have to overcome them."   But she also adds: "I love my profession. I dream about it. I go to bed thinking about what I've done and what I'm doing next. It's my job. But, you know what? Even if that was not the case, I would never stop. Stopping is something that never crossed my mind. I will never retire." NPR Weekend Edition (2013) "Brazil's Leading Lady Still Shines" http://www.npr.org/2013/11/09/243788314/brazils-91-year-old-leading-lady-still-shines   Website: www.bibiferreira.com    Ferreira's career stretches back to her first film appearance in 1936; it includes the founding of an important theater company and starring roles in Brazilian productions of My Fair Lady, Hello, Dolly!, and Man of La Mancha. Today this legendary grande dame remains in peak form, with a touring schedule that would exhaust an artist half her age.   Not until 2013 did New Yorkers experience her for the first time, in a 90th-birthday concert at Lincoln Center. Later that year she sang Édith Piaf in a sold-out concert at Town Hall. This fall, Ferreira will return to Manhattan on Tuesday September 20 and Friday September 23 at Symphony Space, presenting her latest show 4 x Bibi(Four Times Bibi), a salute to four of her peers and inspirations: Édith Piaf, Amália Rodrigues, Carlos Gardel, and Frank Sinatra.   Singing Sinatra in New York is "absurd," she playfully told a TV interviewer in Brazil recently. "Besides, he's a man, and I'm singing his repertoire." But then again, Frank Sinatra, who Ferreira considers "the greatest interpreter of all time," was the singer who could "turn a 32-bar song into a 3-act play," as a colleague once put it, and few can bring a lyric to the stage as Ferreira does. Liza Minnelli, who knows something about the subject, was in the audience at her U.S. debut at Lincoln Center, on April 14, 2013, and was moved to go up on stage to join Ferreira in a performance of "New York, New York."   Few singers have the musical and theatrical tools, and nerve, to re-interpret Amália Rodrigues, the Queen of Fado, before Portuguese audiences; to invoke the power and vulnerability of Édith Piaf, not only in Rio and Sao Paulo but in Paris, or take up the challenge of summoning the spirit of yet another male idol, the iconic Argentine tango singer Carlos Gardel, in Buenos Aires. Her process, she explained, "is to listen without wanting to copy. What you want is to take in whatever is best for you."   The multilingual program of 4 x Bibi includes classics such as Sinatra's "That's Life," and "The Lady is a Tramp;" Rodrigues's "Fadinho Serrano" and "Povos Que Lavas no Rio;" Piaf's "Je Ne Regrette Rien" and "Hymne a l'Amour," and Gardel's "Cuesta Abajo." An engaging storyteller, the show also includes her witty and unvarnished commentary on life, love, age and showbiz. Ferreira will be performing with a 12-piece band conducted by her arranger and musical director Flavio Mendes.   Abigail Izquierdo Ferreira was born on June 1st, 1922 in Salvador, Bahia, in Brazil's Northeast. Her mother, Aida, was a dancer; her father Procopio, a stage actor, theater director and playwright. Her roots in show business are deep. From her mother's side, Ferreira descends from the Queirolo family, which for four generations was involved in the circus and included acrobats, clowns and comics. They were legendary both in Brazil and internationally.

On July 29, 2016, the Department of Homeland Security published a long awaited rule that will help a family member of a U.S. citizen and legal resident that has an order of deportation and never left. In the past where a family member, a spouse, or child of a U.S. citizen, had an order of deportation and never left, the only way to become a legal resident was to make a motion to reopen the case (very difficult) or have an interview at the U.S. consulate. At the interview they would be told that they couldn’t be granted legal status unless they obtained two waivers. One waiver is for accruing more than 180 days of unlawful presence in the United States. The punishment for this activity is a bar to entry for either 3 or 10 years. The other is for the deportation order. There has been a provisional waiver program (I-601A) in existence since 2013, which allows the beneficiary of the application to remain in the U.S. while a decision is made on the waiver application. Without this waiver, the applicant would have to wait in their home country for many months, perhaps years until a decision is made. Now, with this new waiver, the applicant has to return to his home country, but generally remains there for only 3 weeks. A major drawback to the original 601A waiver was that it only could be used for the spouse and children of a U.S. citizen. Eligibility for the provisional waiver program will be enlarged to include all family-based and other intending immigrants who would be found inadmissible due to unlawful presence. And the qualifying relatives who will suffer the necessary extreme hardship will include both U.S. citizens and lawful permanent resident aliens (LPRs). In addition, the final regulation makes other important changes. The rule will go into effect on August 29, 2016, on which date the agency will also publish a new Form I-601A. THE ORDER OF DEPORTATION PROBLEM A major problem in the immigrant community is that there are many people that have been ordered to depart or granted Voluntary Departure but never left. When the person departs the United States while a final order is outstanding, he or she executes that order. And the execution of the order makes the person inadmissible for a period of five or ten years (20 years in some situations). There is “waiver” for the deportation called Application for Permission to Reapply for Admission into the United States After Deportation or Removal (Form I-212 ). In the past you would have to apply for this waiver after you left the U.S. creating an additional delay and longer separation of families. The new regulation allows persons who have been ordered removed to apply for a “waiver” of this ground of inadmissibility before it becomes active because of their departure. This is done by filing the Form I-212 with the USCIS in the jurisdiction where the person was ordered removed. Before going to the consular interview. Once approved, the individual's order of removal, deportation, or exclusion would no longer bar him or her from obtaining an immigrant visa abroad. Once the approval is received, the person would then be eligible to apply for the provisional waiver (I-601A) – as discussed above. Understand persons who were ordered deported and left and then reentered without inspection on or after April 1, 1997 triggers a separate ground of inadmissibility called the “permanent bar. This ground may not be cured through the provisional waiver process; instead the person must reside abroad for ten years and then obtain a waiver by filing a Form I-212. Also understand that this waiver has no affect on other bars to admissibility, such as criminal case, which requires a different waiver. These two waivers are a godsend to many families living in fear of deportation. Now they can really come out of the shadows.   For more information go to apsanlaw.com.

Great News --  You can get legal status if you entered Illegally and   Married a U.S. Citizen or a Green Card Holder. Even if you were ordered deported!!! You can be granted a waiver for your unlawful status  BEFORE  you leave for the consular interview and return in about 3 weeks. Our Office had over 200 cases approved during 2015   In the U.S. there are spouses and children of U.S. citizens (immediate relatives) and legal residents who are in the United States are not eligible to apply for lawful permanent resident (LPR) status while in the United States due to their illegal entry. Under prior law, these immediate relatives must travel abroad to obtain an immigrant visa from the Department of State (DOS) to return to the United States to request admission as an LPR (Lawful Permanent Resident), and, must request from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) a waiver of inadmissibility as a result of their unlawful presence in the United States. Without such a waiver the applicant would not be able to return to the U.S. for a period of not less than 3 years. In other words, under the prior regulations, these immediate relatives and spouse and child of a Lawful Permanent resident cannot apply for the waiver in the United Sates and would not receive their Green Card until after their immigrant visa interviews abroad. As a result of their unlawful presence in the U.S., these relatives had to remain outside of the United States, separated from their spouses, parents, or children, while USCIS adjudicates their waiver applications. In some cases, waiver application processing took well over one year, prolonging the separation of these immediate relatives from their U.S. citizen spouses, parents, and children. The new provisional unlawful presence waiver (I-601A) process facilitates the issuance of immigrant visa for immediate relatives of U.S. citizens and spouse and children of Lawful Permanent Residents, who are otherwise admissible to the United States except for the 3-year and 10-year unlawful presence bars, which are triggered upon departure from the United States. The waiver process allows eligible immediate relatives to apply for a provisional unlawful presence waiver while they are still in the United States and before they leave to attend their immigrant visa interview abroad. Once abroad the process take only 3 weeks. You may remain in your country for up to 4 weeks to visit family and take care of business. Entering the U.S. is simple and about 30 days later you receive the Green Card in the mail. Aliens in removal (deportation) proceedings Aliens in removal proceedings are allowed to participate in this new provisional unlawful presence waiver process if their removal proceedings are administratively closed and have not been re-calendared at the time of filing the Form I-601A.  Aliens whose removal proceedings are terminated or dismissed are covered in the general population of aliens who are eligible to apply for a provisional unlawful presence waiver. Aliens who have already been ordered deported or removed. If you have been ordered Deported or Removed, you will also qualify. However you will need to apply for 2 different waivers, one for being ordered deported (i-212) and the other for having remained in the U.S. illegally.(I-601A) Interesting to note that Apsan Law Offices, LLC, had over 200 cases approved last year.

Release Date: July 29, 2016 Rule to Extend Process to All Individuals Who Are Statutorily Eligible for the Waiver WASHINGTON—U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced a final rule expanding the existing provisional waiver process to allow certain individuals who are family members of U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents (LPRs), and who are statutorily eligible for immigrant visas, to more easily navigate the immigration process.  The provisional waiver process promotes family unity by reducing the time that eligible individuals are separated from their family members while they complete immigration processing abroad, while also improving administrative efficiency. This final rule builds on a process established in 2013 to support family unity.  Under that process, certain immediate relatives of U.S. citizens can apply for provisional waivers of the unlawful presence ground of inadmissibility, based on the extreme hardship their U.S. citizen spouses or parents would suffer if the waiver were not granted.  The rule announced today, which goes into effect on Aug. 29, 2016, expands eligibility for the provisional waiver process to all individuals who are statutorily eligible for the waiver of the unlawful presence ground of inadmissibility. USCIS expects to update its Policy Manual to provide guidance on how USCIS makes “extreme hardship” determinations in the coming weeks. Until now, only immediate relatives of U.S. citizens were eligible to seek such provisional waivers before departing the United States for the processing of their immigrant visas.  Those eligible for the provisional waiver process under the 2013 rule are only a subset of those eligible for the waiver under the statute.  This regulation expands eligibility for the process to all individuals who are statutorily eligible for the waiver. To qualify for a provisional waiver, applicants must establish that their U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident spouses or parents would experience “extreme hardship” if the applicants are not allowed to return to the United States.  The final rule also makes changes to Form I-601A, Application for Provisional Unlawful Presence Waiver.  These changes will go into effect along with the final rule.  The updated form will be posted on USCIS’ website at uscis.gov/i-601a on August 29, 2016. Applicants should not submit a request for a provisional waiver under the expanded guidelines until the final rule takes effect on Aug. 29, 2016.  If you do so before that date, USCIS may deny the application. For more information on this program, please visit www.apsanlaw.com or www.drmoises.com (in portuguese)or follow us on YouTube, and Facebook.

“If voting achieved anything, they would make it illegal,” the rebel and anarchist Emma Goldman, who knew something about freedom and liberty (having been deprived of both a few times), once sardonically remarked.  Well, Emma, on June 23rd, 2016, Brexit, the shorthand for the British referendum to leave the European Union, by a stunning vote of 52% to 48%, achieved something important, historic: the first breach in the EU prison walls.  Cheers, Britain! Hip! Hip! Hooray! Like the Soviet bloc of countries who high-tailed it to freedom when the Berlin Wall collapsed overnight in 1989, many of the other 27 EU member countries may (indeed, should) soon take their cue and flee this political and economic prison.   ** The “United States of Europe” aka the European Union, was an immaculate misconception, a unicorn, a blue sky daydream become a nightmare.  The original European kumbaya idea was open borders, free flowing trade, finance, goods & services, eventually a common currency and no more European wars.  Welcome to Paradise. This politico-economic union consisted of 6 original founding signees in 1960 (trivia quiz: name them*).  Since the demise of the Soviet Union it had become a bubbling gumbo of 28 countries (trivia quiz 2: name them**) with different cultures, histories, languages and currencies (at least until the Euro was instituted in 1999).  What could possibly go wrong among that happy family of nations? Brussels, the capital of bland, became the bureaucratic ground zero of this continental concoction, along with the accompanying sense that national sovereignty and identity was silently slipping away from the member countries as Brussels technocrats and commissioners, for the benefit of private corporate and financial interests, engineered a continent-wide deindustrialization and jobs drought.  Whatever era of good feeling there still was lasted until the Euro gobbled up the national currencies in 1999 and the insatiable economic monster neoliberal Globalization began to debt bomb the entire world.  The EU, in effect, has morphed over the years into the European branch of the international criminal enterprise of banksters, corporate cannibals, aiding and abetting bureaucrats and crooked politicians that represent the true nature and essence of Globalization. Gluttonous greed! In addition to moving European manufacturing to the poverty lands of the Far East, throwing homegrown workers to the wolves and essentially breaking the historic Social Contract, the EU Brigands - the sociopathic European banksters of Frankfurt, Paris and primarily the City of London (not to mention Wall Street!) - peddled their poisoned financial products freely across Europe while a reunified powerhouse Germany not surprisingly threw its considerable financial and industrial weight around refighting World War 2 by checkbook across Europe and this time getting a different result. “Shut up and drink your dose of austerity!  You owe us money!”  EU elites nobody elected, the IMF, ECB, Deutsche Bank and the gnomes of Brussels (with Goldman Sachs, Chase, B of A and their pals lurking in the wings), declared from on high after their debt bombs exploded across Europe in the 2008 economic crash they helped cause. Consequently, the gen pop of the member nations have become nothing more than collateral damage in the war of the 1% against taxes, labor, living wages, pensions, health and human services, infrastructure maintenance, education, a functioning and fair manufacturing and industrial base and the commonwealth in general.    An unintended consequence of this piracy was a wave of migration across those open borders from the poorer member countries of the southern and eastern tiers to the bright lights and big cities of the richer members, Britain, France, Germany and Holland.  The disgruntled Brits referred to it as the invasion of the Polish plumbers! (More recently, the EU has experienced a tidal wave of migrants and desperate refugees from the deadly destructive wars unleashed on the Islamic world by Rogue Nation USA and its NATO sidekicks.  NATO being another essentially European organization, dancing to America’s militaristic tunes and dedicated to weapons-buying and war-mongering, whose sell-by date has long expired and should be nixed, or rather, Nexited.) Turns out that Welcome to Paradise was merely a tantalizing sales pitch and cover story for what has become the massive looting of the European continent’s national identities, assets and treasures. And it’s not against the law because the plunderers themselves wrote the laws.  Of all the EU member countries, Britain had enough financial common sense to retain the pound sterling and was never in the chokehold the banksters had on the Euro countries when the 2008 financial crash occurred.  However, the Brits were not spared the thin gruel of austerity.   One of the prime movers and architects of this grotesque and heartless neoliberal economic philosophy was UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.  Another UK PM, who sold out to Globalization, was the repulsive and rapacious huckster Tony Blair.  The ruling Tory Party and Prime Minister David Cameron, the Oxford twit, instituted their own crushing austerity program on national industries and community services in 2009.  Indeed, the very idea of a Brexit referendum was a cynical political ploy of Cameron, who imagined it would be a slam dunk victory for remaining in the EU. He resigned in tears the day after his humiliating defeat. So what now? For the moment there is the inevitable sore loser lamenting by the have mores in the UK that their golden goose has been cooked by the British have nots and the nostalgic little Englanders, whose Brexit votes carried the day. There is also a bit of buyers’ remorse from some Brexit voters susceptible to the “It’s The End Of The World” fear campaign immediately mounted by the Brussels Brigade. It should also not be forgotten that just last year, the cadaver formerly known as Greece, voted 3-1 against the evil austerity program imposed on it by Brussels and the European finance ministers and banksters for its failure to repay the impossible debts these same banksters had hamstrung the Greek people with.  In cruel revenge for this popular NO vote (“OXI”), the EU Capos, led by the smug and censorious German PM, Angela Merkel, simply ignored the referendum vote, knee-capped Alexei Tsipras, the Greek Prime Minster, and slammed the hapless country with an even more crippling austerity masquerading as a financial bailout, which was, in fact, merely the banksters paying themselves back from one account to another for their dirty business. There is no doubt the Eurocrats will fight to maintain their diabolical dictatorial grip on the power and purse of Europe, the world’s largest single market.  Their business plan of plunder, looting, thievery and fraud is deeply embedded like deathwatch beetles in the EU structure. They and their co-conspirators around the world still own the propaganda megaphone and the rigged wheel of fortune.  But despite what the greedheads of Globalization believe, “too much is never enough” is not a law of nature. Speaking during the first Battle of Britain, Winston Churchill declared: “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”  He was not referring to a handful of debt-collecting greedy banksters and bureaucrats. The Brexit Batallions have won the current Battle of Britain.  It remains to be seen who will emerge as their Churchill. **** Trivia Quiz Answers: *Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands ** Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom (!) ****