The H-2B non-agricultural temporary worker program allows U.S. employers to bring foreign nationals to the United States to fill temporary non-agricultural jobs.
For more information about the H-2B program, see the link to the left under "H-2B Non-Agricultural Workers."
The Consolidated Natural Resources Act of 2008 (CNRA) extended U.S. immigration laws to the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), and authorized the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to create the CNMI-Only Transitional Worker (CW-1) program to ensure adequate employment in the CNMI until the program is phased out on December 31, 2014.
The United States Mission to Nigeria is pleased to announce an expansion of the Drop Box Visa Renewal Program, tentatively to start of June 9th. This program allows certain visa applicants who have previously been issued U.S. visas to renew their visas without attending an interview.
I am reporting here comments from and my responses to a member of our community, "Julissa," regarding whether or how she could apply for a green card herself if she has a Master's degree. Do note, if a set of new immigration laws gets passed, all this could change.
USCIS to Publish New Form to Allow Individuals to Renew Their Deferred Action
If the employee was already working for the employer using AC21 (using EAD) and was already on payroll Then what steps employer has to do to actually get the employee on the GC job other than changing I-9 details. And what document proof employee need to have that may be helpful when one apply for citizenship ? to prove that employee indeed gave employee the GC job ?
Are they changing the law for EB-1? What is the change?
Number 70
Volume IX
Washington, D.C
A. STATUTORY NUMBERS
Processing Queue | Priority Dates | |
---|---|---|
Month |
Processing Queue | Request Date | Status* |
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H-1B |
Rajiv was extremely helpful in providing his thoughts on the situation i was in. I have been following his posts and since his insights were to the point and bring in a lot of clarity I made an attempt to approach him for suggestions. Evevn though i was a complete stranger, they accomodated time and scheduled me an appointment to discussion on my needs. Really appreciate their efforts and kindness.
Thank you very much!
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is issuing policy guidance in the USCIS Policy Manual relating to changes of dates of birth and names per court orders.
For more information please click on Policy Alert
For Immediate Release
DHS Press Office
Contact: 202-282-8010
My husband and I got our green cards through my husband's Employer (EB3). We submitted I-140, I-485 for primary beneficiary (my husband), I-485 for derivative beneficiary (me) on December 27th 2004 (visa dates were current)
Our entire application got rejected on Jan 04 2005.I attached the letters mailed to us. USCIS stated that my signature was missing Our lawyer responded to USCIS on Jan 05 2005 and refiled the rejected application on March 08 2005 (visa dates not available for EB3 in March) He requested USCIS to honor December 27 2004 stamp-date for Primary Beneficiary my husband as his application was complete. He also mentioned that he has is resubmitting my application with my revised signature Instead of just accepting my husband's application, USCIS also accepted my application on March 8th 2005 receipt date - March 10th 2005. During Visa Debacle in July 2007 , we received our green cards on September 2007. I am eligible for applying citizenship. I am in a dilemma whether to apply or not. One of the lawyer’s I contacted before said that USCIS sometimes wrongly accepts applications without visa dates and prematurely approves them too and mine might be one of those cases.During citizenship application, they will review the whole immigration history and there is a chance that your green card will be revoked.
Is it safe not to apply for Citizenship and renew it when needed?
This is likely to be a long discussion. My bottomline recommendation: let your husband obtain his naturalization first. Thereafter you apply for yours. If something goes wrong, his naturalization gets you another green card right away, without ever leaving the USA.
Very procedural lawyers and responsive to requests.
WASHINGTON—Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, Secretary of the Treasury Jacob J. Lew, White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Director Alejandro Mayorkas will help USCIS celebrate our nation’s 237th birthday as the agency welcomes more than 7,800 new citizens during more than 100 naturalization ceremonies across the country and overseas from July 1 to July 5.
Statement from Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano:
Immigration Reform 2013 Status
I wanted to give you quick overview of where we are as of today in the immigration reform effort. As you know the comprehensive immigration bill labeled S.744 was passed by Senate, and the voting in the Senate reflected what kind of support there is generally amongst the two parties (Senate and House of Republicans (House)) for this reform effort.
The composition of the Senate is currently 54 Democrats, one Independent and 45 Republicans. A total of 100 Senators. When the bill was voted upon, it was passed 68 to32. All Democrats voted for it, one Independent voted for it, but only 13 Republicans in the Senate voted for the bill. So less than one third (of Republicans voted for passage). This means that Democrats overwhelmingly support the reform, the immigration bill S. 744. But Republicans are not by any means, or in any way shape or form overwhelmingly or even in a majority in favor of the reform as it was proposed.
So, now bill has been passed the Senate. 68 to 32. It’s a good margin, but the problem situation in the House is totally different. The politics of the situation is that the Latino, Hispanic vote is becoming in proportion much larger. It is exponentially expanding. The Republicans leaders rightly believe that they must curry favor or must be considered a friend to the Hispanic industry of immigration. A lot of Republicans also believe that they have no incentive to pass an amnesty bill. One thing I would say that as far as reform of the legal immigration is concerned I don't think we have too much controversy about that. Both parties agreed that certain things need to be done, like we need skilled immigration professional. Special provisions for PhDs, physicians, people who have Master’s degrees, people with STEM degrees. We need all that and some way to remove the backlog, which is horrendous for many countries. For instance, India has nine to ten years of backlog waiting for a Green Card. So there is consensus among both parties on legal immigration. It is the amnesty part, the enforcement and border protection, which are the key areas of disagreement.
If you look on the Republicans composition, only 24 out of 234 House Republicans represent districts that have any appreciable numbers of Hispanic voters, more than 25 percent. So, only 24 out of 234. Where is the incentive for them to pass an immigration bill with amnesty? In fact, many of the Republicans come from districts that actually oppose amnesty. Republican Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) was speaking in Lynchburg, Virginia yesterday and passions were really running high against the amnesty.
So in the House even if Democrats all get together, the problem is how do we move the reform forward. House is controlled by Republicans, 234 to 201. House Speaker, John Boehner (R-OH) has said that he won't bring the Senate bill up for a vote if he does not have the support of a majority of the House Republicans (known as Hastert Rule). He says, I will not even allow this Senate bill to be voted on in the House unless a majority of House Republicans support the bill. And if we look at the cross-section of the voting that occurred in Senate, less than one third of Republicans support. It’s not good sign to get that kind of support.
So, it appears at least at this stage that the Senate bill will have very tough time going through the House as today’s politics stand.
What are the options?
Four obvious options, the fourth option is very unlikely, which is House leadership brings up the the Senate bill up for vote.
There are four options, but again it’s important to understand what happens if there are two separate bills addressing some of the same areas or all of the same areas, and there are controversies among those bills, then it goes into something called “conference”. When we get into conference, the idea is representatives from Senate and the representative from House will meet together and they will iron out their differences. A lot of times if you want to effect the Senate bill, all you have to do is pass something in the House and then it goes into the conference where you can work on one bill or the other, agree, negotiate and then take the negotiated version back to both chambers for voting Senate and House. So, option number one is House passes its own bill or bills. Actually, here we are talking about comprehensive, some kind of comprehensive set of bills, then it goes for conference. Option two, the House passes any bill, it does not have to be comprehensive bill, something that effects or contradicts the Senate version again we go into conference.
Another interesting option and normally this would not be a really good option but here may be worth considering. I doubt it, but I am not a political pundit just a lawyer. House can actually vote on the Senate bill without the House Speaker’s support. If 218 house members vote for a discharge petition, which means we don’t care what the Speaker says, we are going to vote on this bill anyway. That means House Democrats need 17 votes from Republicans to get a discharge petition and vote on the Senate bill.
So, what are the four options again:
1. Comprehensive bill by House;
2. Any bill by House;
3. Discharge petition; and
4. House leadership brings up the Senate bill to vote which is unlikely.
Let us talk about a comprehensive bill. House had its own “Gang of Eight” people working on a comprehensive immigration bill. Their focus was a lot more on enforcement, on border security, etc. But then one of the Congressman, Raul Labrador (R-ID), quit. The now “Gang of Seven” still might produce a comprehensive House bill. If such a bill is produced, we will get into conference, negotiate and then finally vote on the negotiated bill. So number one is Comprehensive bill.
Number two is any bill. As I mentioned Rep. Goodlatte from Virginia, the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, has produced a series of immigration related bills. House Democrats do not like it because it’s a piecemeal approach and there are all kinds of very extreme positions taken by Bob Goodlatte that House Democrats feel are inimical or enemies of immigration reform. But one of the ways, this series of bills, could be just a device to force matters into conference. If any of these bills pass in the Republican controlled House, then we will all get into conference anyway, where we can negotiate based upon the Senate version of the bill and make changes to it and then go back with the compromise. So the passage of a series of extreme bills could be a way to force matter into conference.
Option three is a discharge petition. Discharge petition normally its considered to be very bad form. If a Republican votes for a discharge petition it’s disloyal, it’s considered to be bad form. But here, Speaker Boehner himself and many other leaders, who are perhaps more in tune with the needs of the time, have said that they want immigration reform. But it looks like there is very strong opposition from certain elements within the Republican Party, which is basically muting some of these more moderate or more aware. I would not call them moderate but more aware members of the Republican Party. So normally a Republican will not vote for a discharge petition, but here who knows. Maybe this is the choice.
The key date to watch is 10th July. On 10th July there will be conference, the House Republican conference, and they meet in the basement of the Capitol to decide how they want to move forward. So that's when we will hear about the final strategy. Once again, right now we don’t know which way House is going to go, but on 10th July we should have better idea of the direction.
All Readers, I quote from my latest msg. to Mr. Rajiv Khanna's office. Please make yourself more aware on your issues by visiting his web-site (and positively contributing to it) and get advice from his office for your particular needs. All cases are NOT the same. Quote Dear Mr Khanna I barely get time to go to your web-site, though I know it is an ocean of information for all those awaiting their immigration process at some stage or the other. Today I happened to spend an hour there and learnt that your Office had done me good!! I live in an area which lacks Indian neighbors and in my Office too, I am the only Indian working in my whole division! Therefore, there is seldom any interaction with people who are at a similar stage as me in the Immigration process. When my I-140 was filed, your Legal Assistant Nimia Aranibar informed me of the CP option. Though I might have surprised her with my lack of knowledge on this process, she explained the process to me and answered my doubts. And she did as I opted for. No suggestions or implications or other discussion. She was very professional in giving me the information and in answering my questions on the issue. She even understood my concerns with the CP process and offered to clarify my doubts and suggested the recourse to this choice if I needed a recourse at a later date. After reading the chat-site on your web-site, I now realise that the lady was giving me good information at the right time. There are so many people on the web who feel have been un-informed of this process. I, on the contrary, have got the right information from your office and am very happy about this. Thank you and best regards Prateek Rishi Nimia, reading in copy, thank you very much for the time taken to explain me the two processes.