Today, April 7, 2015, USCIS announced that it has reached the H-1B cap for FY2016. Before running the lottery, USCIS will complete initial intake for all filings received during the filing period. Initial intake/review will sort out multiple or duplicate H-1B petitions filed by an employer for one employer. Regulations…
Today, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has reached the congressionally mandated H-1B cap for fiscal year (FY) 2016. USCIS has also received more than the limit of 20,000 H-1B petitions filed under the U.S. advanced degree exemption. USCIS will use a computer-generated process, also known as the lottery, to…
If a petitioner filed an FY16 H-1B cap petition in a timely manner for the fiscal year 2016 and has received notification from the delivery service used suggesting that there may be a delay or damage to the package, the petitioner may file a second H-1B petition. The second H-1B…
By Lupe Lopez It was 1984 and I was meeting a friend at the Immigration office in San Francisco. My friend was running late and asked that I wait for her in the courtroom. She gave me the number of the room and as I walked into the courtroom I…
On March 4, 2015, the federal district court in the Northern District of Florida ruled in Perez v. Perez that the Department of Labor (DOL) lacks authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) to issue regulations in the H-2B program. This decision vacated and permanently enjoined DOL from enforcing…
By Lupe Lopez Inez made the dangerous journey from Guatemala to the border in Tijuana. She believed that she had been lucky. She was able to make it to Tijuana without incident. When she arrived in Tijuana she kept to herself just as she had been warned. Within a few…
The power of the purse has spoken and the Democrats have come out on top. On Tuesday March 3rd the Republican led House of Representatives passed a bill funding the Department of Homeland Security up until September of this year. The bill passed by a vote of 257 to 167,…
As a refresher for our readers, earlier this week the federal government filed an expedited emergency motion to stay (prevent execution) of the injunction issued by the federal judge in Texas stopping implementation of expanded DACA and DAPA programs. The federal government warned in its motion that if judge Hanen did…
Today, on February 24, 2015, USCIS announced that effective May 26, 2015 it will extend eligibility for employment authorization to certain H-4 dependent spouses of H-1B nonimmigrants to allow them to accept employment in the U.S. Finalizing the H-4 work authorization was an important step toward implementation of the President’s…
By Ekaterina Powell, Esq. As you may already know from reading our prior posts, on February 16, 2015, the Texas federal district court issued a preliminary injunction to stop expanded DACA (expanded guidance concerning deferred action for certain individuals who came to the United States as children) and DAPA (deferred…