Visa Lawyer Blog

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By Lupe Lopez

Alan and Diana married in February 2014.  They quickly filed for Diana’s green card and because they had been married less than two years at the time of the interview, Diana received conditional permanent residence.  Everything was fine and there were no problems until Alan received a promotion to a position in one of the firm’s overseas offices.  Both Alan and Diana were concerned because they knew that Diana would not be able to spend much time out of the U.S. and still maintain her permanent residence.

Alan and Diana came to our office in to get an attorney’s opinion of their situation and to see if there was any way they could file a form that would maintain Diana’s permanent residence while living abroad.  Normally, if you are a permanent lawful resident, you cannot be out of the country for an extended period of time if you wish to maintain your residency; especially for the purpose of obtaining citizenship.  In order to be naturalized as a U.S. Citizen, the permanent resident must fulfill residency requirements and show evidence that he or she has been physically present in the United States for at least half of the three years (for people who have gained status through marriage to a U.S. Citizen – half of five years for all others).  Diana would not be able to accumulate the time needed if she is forced to live abroad with her husband.

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By Yingfei Zhou, Esq.

The Conrad 30/J-1 Visa Waiver program allows J-1 medical doctors to apply for a waiver of the 2-year residence requirement upon completion of the J-1 exchange visitor program. From October 1 through September 30 of each year, up to 30 waivers can be recommended by each state’s Department of Health. If the home government funded the physician’s exchange program, the physician also needs to obtain a “no objection” letter from his or her home country. Once the waiver is approved, applicants can file for cap-exempt H-1B visa to work for the health care facility.

In order to be eligible, the applicant must be a physician practicing clinical medicine full time (no less than 40 hours per week) in an area designated by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as a Health Professional Shortage Area (HPSA), Medically Underserved Area (MUA), or Medically Underserved Population (MUP). The employment should commence within 90 days from the date the waiver is approved by the USCIS.

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Great news for Indian Nationals! The United States Department of State Bureau of Consular Affairs recently released the August Visa Bulletin which summarizes the availability of immigrant visas for the month of August for family-based and employment-based visa preferences. According to Section 201 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) the allotted number of employment based visas is set to at least 140,000 visas for the worldwide level. The Visa Bulletin for August indicates that the second preference EB-2 employment-based category for India has advanced by 5 years when compared to the Visa Bulletin in the recent year. The advancement of the employment based second preference EB-2 category provides Indian nationals whose Form I-140 Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker was approved and whose priority dates fall before January 22nd of 2009, with the opportunity to apply for their green cards beginning August 2014. For priority dates related to family sponsored preferences and diversity immigrant categories please click here to read the August Visa Bulletin. For legal questions please contact our office and we would be happy to help.

Employment Based

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Want to track the status of a pending case? Moving to a new address? Want to report a problem with your case? No problem!

Our loyal fans and followers, who communicate with us through our various social networking sites and web page, often ask our law office how they can track or check the status of their pending case, how they can change their address with USCIS while their case is pending, and how they can report a problem with their case. These are all very important questions. It is imperative that all applicants who have pending cases with USCIS regularly check the status of their case both online and by calling USCIS. There are several ways to communicate with USCIS. You can check the status of your pending case online, submit a service request online, schedule an Infopass online, and submit a change of address online.  For time sensitive issues, applicants should check the status of their pending case or report a problem with their pending case by calling USCIS directly by phone. In this post we will walk you through the steps of how to communicate with USCIS via all of these methods.

How to check the status of a case online:

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By Ekaterina Powell, Esq.

Since the H-1B season kicked off on April 1, 2014, USCIS has started issuing Requests for Evidence (RFE). This article will address the RFE trends and practice tips.

Below are 4 main points USCIS addresses in the RFEs:

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The Law Office of Jacob J. Sapochnick is delighted to introduce associate attorney, Ms. Ekaterina Powell,  for our second staff spotlight.

Ms. Powell has worked for our firm since June 2010 and is one of six attorneys working in our law office. Ms. Powell specializes in various family-based, investment-based, and employment-based immigration matters. Ms. Powell’s specific focus of work is on nonimmigrant and immigrant work and investment visas, extraordinary ability petitions, national interest waivers, EB-5 investment petitions, waivers of inadmissibility, VAWA cases, H-1B/LCA compliance matters, government worksite audits and investigations, as well as complex requests for evidence, motions and appeals.

ekaterina
Bio: After receiving her law degree in Russia in 2007, Ms. Powell decided to make California her permanent home. Within only three years of immigrating to the U.S., Ms. Powell graduated from an American law school and became a California licensed attorney.

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USCIS recently announced new policy changes regarding Form I-693, Report of Medical Examination and Vaccination Record. Starting June 1, 2014, USCIS has limited the validity period for all Forms I-693 to one year from the date that USCIS receives the form. This updated policy applies to any Form I-693 supporting a benefit application that USCIS adjudicates on or after June 1, 2014.

If you are applying for adjustment of status, you may submit Form I-693 in one of the following ways:

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By Lupe Lopez

Daniel couldn’t take it anymore.  Here he was being tortured, humiliated, and abused in the country where he thought he would be able to live a better life.  He could recall the excitement he felt when he first arrived in the United States.  He was young, inexperienced, and hopeful of living the “American Dream.”  Instead, Daniel was in a living nightmare.  He was trapped (or so he believed) in a marriage that was filled with verbal, physical, and sexual abuse.  He believed that there was nothing he could do but to ride it out.  Now that he was here, he was ashamed to go back to his home country having failed at marriage and at life.

Daniel had come to the United States as a tourist.  Daniel met Bethany through a friend and from the moment Daniel met her, he thought this was the woman of his dreams.  He fell in love with her immediately.  They began dating and soon after they decided to room together; not just to save money, but also to spend more time together.  In the beginning all went well.   But when it was time for Daniel to go home, Bethany begged him to stay.  Bethany immediately proposed to him and told him that he couldn’t leave without her.  Daniel was elated and accepted her proposal.  They married soon after.

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