USCIS Forms Update Notice
USCIS recently updated the following form:
USCIS recently updated the following form:
Number 62
Volume X
Washington, D.C
A. STATUTORY NUMBERS
This bulletin summarizes the availability of immigrant numbers during February for: “Final Action Dates” and “Dates for Filing Applications,” indicating when immigrant visa applicants should be notified to assemble and submit required documentation to the National Visa Center.
Release Date
USCIS is reminding the public that they offer immigration services that may help people affected by unforeseen circumstances such as natural disasters. Examples of unforeseen circumstances include, but are not limited to, the Marshall fire in Colorado.
The following measures may be available on a case-by-case basis upon request:
USCIS recently updated the following form(s):
Petition for U Nonimmigrant Status
12/06/2021 01:32 PM EST
Release Date
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced clarifying guidance on how USCIS determines whether an O-1B beneficiary will be evaluated as a person of extraordinary ability in the arts or as a person of extraordinary achievement in the motion picture or television industry when a case has elements of both.
Students in the following fields will be able to obtain STEM OPT extensions for 24 months:
Release Date
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services today announced updated guidance on adjudicating requests for “National Interest Waivers” regarding job offer and labor certification requirements for certain advanced degree professionals and individuals of exceptional ability. This includes discussing the unique considerations for persons with advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields and entrepreneurs.
Release Date
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services today issued policy guidance clarifying how it evaluates evidence to determine eligibility for O-1A nonimmigrants of extraordinary ability, with a focus on petitions filed for individuals in science, technology, engineering, or math (STEM) fields, as well as how USCIS determines whether an O-1 beneficiary’s prospective work is within their area of extraordinary ability or achievement.
Discussion Topics, Jan 20, 2022 FAQs:
1. EB-1B for postdoctoral holder after a gap of several years in career 2. Date of birth and name corrections in birth certificate 3. COVID-19 delays in tourist/visitor extensions for B-2 holding parent and applying for their green card
1. My Son was born in February 2020 in the USA, where my wife is on an F1 visa working on OPT. Due to the Covid19 pandemic, I couldn't meet my son for two years. Kindly suggest to me the way forward to meet my son and wife. I also tried to travel on a tourist visa and F1 Visa. Unfortunately, I got both rejections. I'm an Indian taxpayer and an IT employee.
2. My brother is a US citizen, and he applied for our mother's green card. Everything is clear, all paperwork is done, but due to the pandemic, we are waiting for the interview date from March 2021. Do you have any information on how we get the date or how much time it will take?
3. My daughter is in Dallas, US, and under medical treatment. She is there with an IN40 visa. As a father, I want to be there during her medical urgency. How can I get a visa now to be with her in the US?
4. I am a US citizen currently in India. I am traveling back to the States in mid-February for two months and want to take my Indian-citizen senior citizen mother with me for that duration. Her last US tourist visa expired eight years ago. (She has an active Schengen visa on her passport) Is there a way she can get a short-term two-month visa to the US?
5. I stayed outside of the US for more than two years because of COVID-19. Am I eligible for naturalization? I came to the USA in August 2016.
*Please note that the queries have been put together and edited by the Economic Times to address similar questions at once and that the answers are clear and relevant to the audience.
1. My Son was born in February 2020 in the USA, where my wife is on an F1 visa working on OPT. Due to the Covid19 pandemic, I couldn't meet my son for two years. Kindly suggest to me the way forward to meet my son and wife. I also tried to travel on a tourist visa and F1 Visa. Unfortunately, I got both rejections. I'm an Indian taxpayer and an IT employee.
Note: For the NRI readers, The Economic Times has started an immigration helpdesk. A team of experts which includes Rajiv S. Khanna will address the most pressing issues. Please see the link below.
Release Date
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has updated the USCIS Policy Manual to reflect new guidance on how USCIS determines whether a case warrants expedited treatment. The new guidance is effective immediately.
This update:
Release Date
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services today announced that the initial registration period for the fiscal year 2023 H-1B cap will open at noon Eastern on March 1 and run through noon Eastern on March 18, 2022. During this period, prospective petitioners and representatives will be able to complete and submit their registrations using the online H-1B registration system.
I applied I-130 for my father to get his GC through Consular processing. I'm a US citizen myself. However I got RFE asking for his birth certificate. I have these queries: The supplemental documents for I-130 for parents as per USCIS application only need US citizen's birth certificate and not the parent's birth certificate. So I don't understand why RFE was issued at this stage? My father was born in the time when the birth certificates were not available. As per the dept of state reciprocity website, it clearly states: "Exceptions: Birth certificates are not available to persons born prior to 1968. " Since it is acknowledged by reciprocity that birth certificates are not available, do I still need to provide NABC (Non-Availability of Birth Certificate)?
Video Transcript
I would prefer you to get a non-availability certificate along with two affidavits from people who were alive when your parents were born. That is what I would recommend. If it is too cumbersome you could try to set up the reciprocity table as evidence if such documents are not available. FAQ in detail...
Note: This is a verbatim transcript of the referenced audio/video media delivered as oral communication, and, therefore, may not conform to written grammatical or syntactical form.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) offers you a variety of services both before and after you file your case. For example, using the links provided on the left panel, you can:
September 9, 2022:
Important FAQ from the USCIS about what to expect during this fiscal year #immigration
https://www.immigration.com/blogs/fiscal-year-2023-employment-based-adj…
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AC21 Green Card Portability after 180 days of I-485 Pendency - Part 1
Recorded 27 July 2012
Hello, everyone. I want to talk today about AC21. There is a lot of mystery, a lot of mystique. People have been asking questions for a few years now, and I’m still not done answering all of the questions. So I thought I’d just record this for you and hopefully I’ll cover most of the issues that I remember. In case I am missing something, let me know. Of course, this is just the first part. I intend to do several parts on this AC21 issue. If you have any follow up questions, you are welcome to send us an email through the Contact Us form on www.immigration.com
What exactly is AC21?
AC21 is an abbreviation for a law called American Competitiveness in the Twenty-First Century Act. I think the law was enacted by Congress back in October 2000. So the law has been in effect for fully 12 years, and USCIS has still not given us regulations. It’s very important to have regulations. If you do not have regulations, we have only the bare bones of the law. In IT industry, you think of it as having just a high-level design. We do not have any user interface, we do not have any functionality program, we do not have the code, and we do not really know what the law will really look like in implementation. The last comprehensive interpretation of AC21 was back in May 2005 through something called the Yates Memorandum, given by William R. Yates, which basically answered a lot of questions, but there are still a lot left unanswered.
What is AC21’s effect on H-1?
Basically, this allows you to get H-1 extensions beyond six years; it allows you to change jobs while the H-1 transfer is pending. I’m not discussing this now. I want to focus on Green Card. I will address H-1 later.
AC21 effect on Green Card
Every EB-2, EB-3, and some EB-1 holders can change to a same or similar job as described in their Green Card with any employer anywhere in USA. You are not geographically restricted. If your green card was filed in Colorado, you can move to California or Washington, DC. What is required is the jobs be same or similar.
Your I-140 has been approved, and your I-485 has been pending for 180 days. How are the 180 days counted?
180 days are counted based upon the pendency of I-485, not necessarily after the I-140 has been approved. Let me explain. Let’s say I file your I-140 and I-485 today. After 150 days (five months), your I-140 gets approved, and now your I-485 has been pending 150 days. We only need 30 more days to reach to that 180 day count. In other words, we don’t have to start counting from the date the I-140 has actually been approved. We count based upon how many days the I-485 itself was pending. Once the I-485 is approved, then, by operation of law, we only count what has been remaining of 180 days. Once again, I file today, both the I-140 and I-485. After 150 days, I-140 gets approved. Now I have to wait only 30 more days.
What if I leave before I-140 is approved?
Mr. Yates made it quite clear that, as long as I-140 was approvable when filed, even if you left, it’s not going to affect the merits of your AC21 claim. Once again, if the I-140 was approvable when filed, even if you left, it’s not going to hurt the merits of your AC21 claim, but there is something to worry about.
Does the employer still have the intent to hire me back and I to rejoin?
In other words, what triggers AC21? It is not the approval of the I-140. What if my I-140 and I-485 were not filed together, as happens to a lot of people. Of course, if they were filed together, then remember the 150 days example I gave. Even if you left, the I-140 gets approved. We only have to wait those extra 30 days, and we are comfortable in knowing that we are covered by AC21. But what if my I-140 has been filed, but not my I-485? Then I have to do this analysis. Does the employer have the intention to hire back and I to rejoin them? If so, when my priority date becomes current, I can file for I-485 based upon the letter given by the employer for whom I used to work. If you leave before your I-140 is approved and before the I-485 is filed, you’ve got to have a way to file an I-485 through the employer who has sponsored you, who initially filed for you, who petitioned for you. That means there must be an intention to hire and rejoin.
What if I leave before 180 days are over, but the I-140 is approved?
Now the hypothetical is a little different. Remember the 150 day example. What if I leave on the 150th day, my I-140 is approved, but I am still 30 days short of the 180 days that’s needed for the I-485 to be pending? This hypothetical assumes that both the I-140 and I-485 are concurrently filed. If they were not concurrently filed, then of course the previous analysis--the intent analysis--if the employer has the intent to hire me back, then I can file an I-485. Remember, you can always carry the priority date forward. That’s what we’re talking about. Once the 1-140 is approved, the priority date can be carried forward. We’re talking about AC21. That’s a different law altogether.
If I leave on the 151st day, am I okay?
You are okay as long as USCIS does not start questioning you on the 151st day. Mr. Yates said this. If you have left before 180 days and if you do not have a RFE response due back asking you about your job before the 180 days, you are okay. If I got an RFE before I left and the RFE response is due before 180 days, then the chances are I cannot use the AC21. I can only carry forward my priority date. If you don’t get this, join me in a free community conference call, and I’ll run over your scenario step-by-step.
What if I leave before 180 days are over, but the I-140 is approved, I-485 is pending, and I left during the 151st day? As long as an RFE response is not due before the 180 days, you are okay. It’s fairly safe to assume that you are going to be fine in any of these scenarios where you’ve left before the 180 days are over, because, typically, the RFE itself gives you a few weeks to respond and, by that time, if you’ve thought it over, you can respond with a new job offer.
What if I’ve left, but I don’t have a job for some time? Let’s say you left on the 150th day. Your I-485 pending and I-140 approved, or both are pending, what if you do not have a job for some time? Same analysis applies as long as an RFE response is not due before the 180 days are over. If it’s due before the 180 days are over, you could have some problem. But, if it is not due, you should be all right. If you do not have a job for some time, that’s okay, too.
May I port from a future job?
This is a very interesting analysis. The Yates Memorandum clearly says yes. So I am working for employer A on a H-1, and employer B has filed for my green card as a future job or, maybe even if I used to work with employer B, then I left them, and they continued by green card. It becomes a future job, then I am not working on that job. You can actually file an I-140 and I-485 for a future job and still do an AC21 to any job. You actually never even have to join the future job as long as your intentions were clean when you filed the I-485. So yes, you can port from a future job, and you can even port without ever joining that employer.
May I port to my own company or business?
This is a question I’m asked quite a lot. The answer is yes. It is not forbidden. Why the double negative? I’ll tell you what I’m worried about. When somebody ports to his or her own company or business, one of the most important things is, remember I talked about jobs must be same or similar? This is where the problem occurs. Let’s say your title was Biochemist or IT Engineer or Software Engineer or Systems Administrator. When you start your company, you kind of become the CEO or Manager. That’s not acceptable. That could cause the problem. But what if you have a company your wife is managing, and you’re just an employee? That’s okay. That can be done. So when you port to your company or business, make sure you discuss this in detail with your lawyers. Make sure you understand what you’re allowed to do and what you’re not allowed to do.
The same or similar analysis is very confusing. We don’t have clear understanding. The closest you are to the jobs being the same, the better off you are.
What do I mean by the same job?
What if I was a Java Developer in one job and a .Net Developer in another job? I think that’s okay. This is my interpretation, because you’re still a developer. Nowhere does the law say you must have the same technologies covering both jobs. In my view, you are okay even with different technologies. I’ve never had this view supported by the government, so consider this my guess, something I would be comfortable arguing in court if I have to.
What is required to do an AC21, and what does it involve?
There is no law on what you are required to do. If you do not inform the government, you are not breaking any law. But in most cases, it is a smart idea to inform the government. Why? Because if you are subject to AC21, you ported over, and then the old employer revokes the I-140, for somebody who has successfully ported, that does not have any effect on them. The old employer can revoke the I-140. You are still entitled to your AC21 benefits. However, I have seen cases when an old employer revoked the I-140. Instead of sending the usual RFE, USCIS sends a Notice of Intent to Revoke the I-485, and if you do not get it in timely manner, sometimes you could have an issue. Then you have to file a Motion to Reopen. It becomes messier. You might not have work authorization, because your I-485 has been revoked. That’s why, further down, I am going to advise you to keep your H-1 active in most of these cases. Even though the chances of something going wrong are extremely small, they do exist, and I like to cover every possible bad scenario that I possibly can. What you have to do is have your lawyers write a letter to the government saying that you are using AC21 and porting over to same or similar job.
May I transfer more than once using AC21?
Yes, you can do 20,000 change of employers. AC21 does not say you can do it only once.
Should I keep my H-1 active?
I just spoke about that. I think you should as far as humanly possible. If, for whatever reason, you cannot, it’s okay. You’re still reasonably safe as long as you keep track of your ****, but, where possible, keep your H-1 active. It’s so much better for you.
What are the dangers in using AC21?
One thing that has always bothered me is, if for some reason your I-485 is denied, for example, you are out of status and not even knowing you are out of status and your I-485 gets denied, you lose your AC21. This is something I’ve seen come up. An employee was placed in California where the LCA was approved for Colorado. That’s a violation of the H-1 laws. Most employers don’t know that. Unfortunately, some of my colleagues I’ve seen poorly advise that you can just file a new LC. That’s not true. H-1 amendments are needed when the move is beyond normal commuting distance. Inadvertently, you have fallen out of status for more than 180 days. Now your I-485 is deniable. You did not know that. The next thing is you’re getting a denial of I-485, and you are losing your right to AC21. That’s one major danger that I see all the time. Other than that, everything is covered if you can keep you H-1 active and, if you cannot, I feel that your risks are minimal. We have filed hundreds, if not thousands, of AC21 cases. I have not had a single case run into any kind of problem.
Sometimes, you can be interviewed. Does your risk of being interviewed increase because you’ve filed an AC21?
I personally don’t think so. I don’t see any indication of that. But, certainly, I’ve heard people say that that’s what happens. I don’t feel that’s a major danger. I don’t think that happens that frequently, but keep that in mind as well.
Folks, I hope I was able to give you some useful information. I know it’s kind of confusing, but we’ll keep talking about it until things become clearer.
Thank you for listening. Good luck.
Thank you!! GC in hand after 12 years!! It was long journey of more than 12 years but have been made easy with Mr. Khanna and his dedicated team! We are very Thankful to him and his team. I got the EB2 approved in less than 2 months which was a big surprise as a Physical Therapist and now change In status for I-485 in less than 3 months which was unbelievably faster than any processing time line mentioned online. I especially would like to thank Mr. Bryant who was always available to answer our questions and concerns and was prompt to reply every email in a short duration. We must have exchanged more than hundred calls or emails. Mr. Khanna was available and with his expertise and knowledge, cleared our doubts and gave the best answers to complicated situations at times. I would also like to Thank Ms. Suman, Ms. Anna and Ms. Prerna for helping with first H1 b approval process and 3 extensions thereafter. I would highly like to recommend their team!