Introducing sweeping changes, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has expanded its role by gaining law enforcement powers previously limited to agencies like Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP). Under a new final rule published today, USCIS will now recruit 1,811-classified special agents—fully empowered officers…
On Tuesday, August 19th, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) issued updated policy guidance clarifying that immigration officers will assess a range of factors when determining whether to grant a favorable exercise of discretion in the green card process—signaling a tougher stance that may create additional hurdles for applicants seeking…
On August 1st the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced new policies that could make immigrants applying for green cards through family-based petitions more vulnerable to deportation. The changes appear in various updates to USCIS’ Policy Manual which states that immigration officials can begin removal proceedings for immigrants who…
Last week the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) released a new policy memorandum that requires the agency to initiate removal proceedings after it denies an application for an immigration benefit, if the foreign national is no longer lawfully present in the United States. Importantly, the memo exempts certain…
It has been less than 24 hours since President Donald Trump has taken office, and he has already signed into law a flurry of executive orders directly impacting immigration. More than a dozen of these executive orders dismantle Biden era immigration policies, and usher in restrictive policies for visa seekers,…
New changes are being implemented for certain self-petitioners filing immigration petitions under the Violence Against Women Act, also known as VAWA. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced that beginning in December they will be conducting in-person interviews for select VAWA self-petitioners who have an I-360 and I-485…
In this blog post we bring you some breaking news. On Friday August 2, 2024, the Biden administration announced that it has paused the humanitarian parole program for nationals of Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, effective immediately due to concerns regarding fraudulent filings and potential abuse of the program. This…
If you are an EB-5 investor in a Regional Center project, you may be interested to learn of new information released by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) regarding Regional Center audits. In March 2022, with the passage of the EB-5 Reform and Integrity Act of 2022, Congress implemented…
This Friday afternoon, we share with you some interesting new insights revealed by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services regarding the recent H-1B electronic registration period for fiscal year 2024. USCIS has disclosed that this H-1B season, it received 758,994 eligible registrations for FY 2024, breaking its previous record of…
A brand-new bill called the H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act of 2020 (S. 3770) sponsored by Republican Senator Chuck Grassley has recently surfaced. As you might have already guessed, the bill seeks to make changes to the current H-1B and L visa programs to reduce fraud and abuse within…