Visa Lawyer Blog

We all know that the recent fee hike, and other changes that happened in July created a massive backlog in application processing. Clients are waiting for months just to get receipts. Well now we may have a solution from Sen. Chuck Schumer - Immigration officials should rehire retirees to help clear a backlog of applications that could keep some people from becoming citizens, he said on Thursday:

"For waves of would-be citizens, bureaucratic incompetence is turning the American Dream into a dream deferred," Schumer said in a news release.

Citizenship and Immigration Services last week announced that people wanting to become U.S. citizens will have to wait 15 months to 18 months, rather than the national average seven months, to naturalize.

The agency received 2.5 million applications in July and August as immigrants tried to beat significant increases in application fees that took effect July 30.

The big Immigration news today in all major news papers that cover US Immigration is the massive delays in application processing. As you may recall due to the fee hike in July millions of applicants filed for Immigration benefits, like Citizenship, family petitions etc.

The application backlog is so large that Citizenship and Immigration Services, a division of the Homeland Security Department, is months behind schedule in returning receipts for checks written to cover fees and indicate to clients that the files are in process.

I get calls every single day from clients inquiring about case status, and all we can tell them is that the case is in process. It just doesn't make sense for this to take so long, but the USCIS were not ready for this volume and now applicants are paying the price.

"Were we caught off guard by the volume? Let's just say it was anticipated it would increase. It was not anticipated it would increase by that much," said Emilio Gonzalez, director of Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Read more here

This Thanksgiving we have a lot to be thankful for, we live in a country is considered to be the symbol of Freedom and Prosperity. Yet, it seems that this country and the government running it, is doing a very bad PR job is welcoming visitors and immigrants to this country.

In my own practice, I often here horror stories from people that were treated poorly and very disrespectfully by our immigration officials. Tourists detained at airports for no reason, professionals coming to work sent back and barred from coming back, and I can go on and on.

Fareed Zakaria published an excellent article in this week's Newsweek magazine. He states:

According to the Commerce Department, the United States is the only major country in the world to which travel has declined in the midst of a global tourism boom. And this is not about Arabs or Muslims. The number of Japanese visiting the United States declined from 5 million in 2000 to 3.6 million last year. The numbers have begun to increase, but by 2010 they're still projected to be 19 percent below 2000 levels. During this same span (2000–2010), global tourism is expected to grow by 44 percent.

The administration and Congress say the right things, have passed a few measures to improve matters and keep insisting that the problem has been solved. But the data and loads of anecdotal evidence suggest otherwise. The basic problem remains: no bureaucrat wants to be the person who lets in the next terrorist. As a result, when one spots any irregularity—no matter how minor—the reflex is to stop, question, harass, arrest and deport. If tens of thousands of foreigners are upset, so what? But if one day a jihadist manages to slip in, woe to the person who stamped his passport. The incentives are badly skewed.

Click here for the article
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If we are not going to change the ways we welcome visitors to this country, let's get ready for less tourist, less students and less culture coming this way.......

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

The California Service Center has informed AILA-CSC Liaison that it has changed its policy with respect to certain forms of concurrent H-1B employment.

In the past, the CSC would approve an H-1B petition for concurrent employment that is cap-subject if the alien was the beneficiary of an approved H-1B petition submitted by a cap-exempt employer, applying a literal reading of INA § 214(g)(6).

CSC has advised that they will start denying concurrent H-1B petitions filed by cap-subject petitioners (such employers that didn't obtain H1B approval this year) notwithstanding the fact that the alien is already working for a cap-exempt institution. The matter is being taken up by out organization AILA and we will update readers of this Blog.

I often deal with government agencies as it relates to immigration, most of the officials we deal with are nice and professionals. Yet from time to time, we come across government officials that feel either they are above the law or that acting as a human being may not be part of the job description.

We often here about ICE agents abusing detainees, government agents acting unethically when investigating aliens and immigrants being deported and entire families torn apart. The recent deportation of a breastfeeding mother is one such story. The decision to separate a mother from her breast-feeding child drew strong denunciations from Hispanic and women’s health groups.

Read more here...

One of our Blog readers pointed out this morning that we are featured on the American Bar Associations National site. ABAJournal.com is the Web site of the flagship magazine of the American Bar Association and is the most exclusive publication for Lawyer in the US. We are fattered to be recognized by such an important authority and will continue to provide up to date information on our Blog as always.

Happy Veterans day to all of you out there!!

Click for the ABA Blog list here

From time to time I will be posting about local updates and important changes that will affect clients and local readers of the Blog. In the past few weeks, the local Immigration offices started scheduling Marriage based adjustment of status interviews in the Downtown office in addition to the Chula Vista location. The office in downtown is located at 880 Front Street.

The USCIS officials that I spoke to reported this to be an attempt to ease the pressure from the Chula Vista office and perhaps expedite interviews this way. Traditionally, the downtown office was used for Naturalization and Citizenship interviews.

In addition the Application Support Center on El Cajon Blvd, is now officially closed. The Application support Center is a location where clients go to process fingerprints and biometrics as part of the adjustment of status process.

As of next week, all such appointment will be scheduled at the new Chula Vista location just behind the USCIS main office on third avenue.

We welcome these changes and hope that this will expedite Marriage interviews locally and make the process as smooth and efficient as possible.

To read about the Marriage interview process and for tips on passing click here!

The up coming New Citizenship Test is generating q lot of interest and anxiety on the part of future applicants. I was interviewed by Fox 6 news last week about this subject and the report aired last night on the 10pm news edition.

Click here to see the report and read the article on the station's website

Guess what, New I-9 form released. On November 7th, 2007, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security ("DHS"), Citizenship and Immigration Services ("CIS") announced that it has released a new version of Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification, as well at the M-274, Handbook for Employers, Instructions for Completing the Form I-9.

The revision of the Form I-9 seeks to achieve full compliance with the document reduction requirements of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 ("IIRAIRA"), which reduced the number of documents that employers may accept from newly hired employees during the employment verification process.

This is huge for employers that were waiting for some substantial revisions since the 1996 legislation.

To read the Fact Sheet from CIS about the New I-9 Form, Click Here.

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I read this morning about a new anti-illegal immigration law that has some farmers and agricultural businesses scrambling for laborers. With excessive enforcement in Oklahoma, no farm workers are to be found to do the job.

Read the full story here...

House and Senate appropriators are tentatively scheduled to convene a conference on Thursday, November 1st to combine the Defense, Military Construction-VA, and Labor-HHS-Education appropriations into one single bill.

One of the issues with which legislators will have to contend is whether or not to remove the Grassley-Sanders amendment (H.ADMT. 3396) from the Labor-HHS appropriations bill (H.R. 3043) which would add an additional fee of $3,500 to the H-1B visa program.

Looming over any progress made during the conference is the veto threat President Bush issued over most appropriations passed in the House and Senate this year, often citing spending levels as the reason.

~Urgent Action Needed: AgJOBS Consideration Nearing!

The Farm, Nutrition, and Bioenergy Act of 2007 or Farm Bill (H.R. 2419) is likely headed to the Senate floor in the coming week. Immigration advocates believe the Farm Bill is an excellent legislative vehicle to carry the AgJOBS bill (S. 340 and H.R. 371) as an amendment.

Take action today, and urge you senators to support AgJOBS at: http://capwiz.com/aila2/issues/alert/?alertid=10352521