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One myth surrounding mandamus lawsuits that never seems to completely go away is that filing a mandamus lawsuit will result in the government retaliating against you with a denial.

It’s understandable how people can make this assumption. Amongst individuals, if you sue someone, you can expect them to be biased against you. However, it just doesn’t work that way when suing the government for immigration delays. These suits are very common and are not taken personally. We’ve filed many mandamus cases and are in touch with other attorneys that have filed many as well. We’ve never heard of a single instance where there was a suspicion that a case was denied due to retaliation. In fact, one attorney who used to work for the government, commented that in his time in government, applicants that sued actually received better and more careful treatment.

Anything is possible, attorneys can never guarantee an outcome. However, it appears that retaliation is, at worst, a very remote risk.