U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services will close all but seven of its 20 field offices worldwide, including major hubs in London, Seoul and Frankfurt, the agency’s director Ken Cuccinelli announced Friday. Source: Law360
Read more...9 August 2019
USCIS reminds that starting August 5, 2019 petitions that do not include the petitioner’s or applicant’s name and primary U.S. office address in Part 1 of the form will be rejected. USCIS will subject all requests for nonimmigrant classifications filed on Form I-129 to this rejection criteria, including the time-sensitive H-2A visa classification for temporary […]
Read more...9 August 2019
On Wednesday, August 7, 2019, the Department of Homeland Security conducted what is reportedly the largest single-state raid in U.S. history. 680 illegal immigrants were arrested in seven different food processing facilities in towns across Mississippi. Later the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Mississippi announced that certain noncitizens with small children were […]
Read more...8 August 2019
Attorney General William P. Barr ruled on Monday that persecution based on family ties no longer qualifies as grounds for asylum, with very few exceptions. This ends asylum protections for migrants solely because their relatives have been persecuted. Migrants are eligible for asylum in the United States if they can prove they were persecuted because […]
Read more...2 August 2019
DHS Acting Secretary McAleenan announced that he has extended Syria’s TPS designation for 18 months. The extension permits current Syrian TPS beneficiaries to re-register for TPS and remain in the U.S. with work authorization through March 31, 2021. There are approximately 7,000 Syrian TPB beneficiaries, per DHS. Source: AILA Doc. No. 19080138.
Read more...1 August 2019
42 House Democrats sent a letter to Attorney General Barr demanding that DOJ immediately rescind its plan to end the use of in-court interpreters for noncitizens appearing at their initial immigration court hearing. The decision to replace human interpreters with pre-recorded videos at immigration court hearings as a “cost-saving measure,” is simply dehumanizing and wrong. […]
Read more...29 July 2019
Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act of 2019 was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on July 10, 2019 and goes to the Senate next for consideration. If enacted, the bill would eliminate the per-country limit for all employment-based immigrants and increase the per-country limit for all family-sponsored immigrants from 7 percent to 15 percent. […]
Read more...26 July 2019
New Rulemaking Brings Significant Changes to EB-5 Program U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) published a final rule on July 24 that makes a number of significant changes to its EB-5 Immigrant Investor Program. The final rule will become effective on Nov. 21, 2019. New developments under the final rule include: Raising minimum investment amounts The standard […]
Read more...24 July 2019
USCIS announced that it is revising the current naturalization test. A working group has been reviewing and updating the test questions, and will also assess potential changes to the speaking portion of the test. USCIS anticipates an implementation date of December 2020 or early 2021. Source: AILA Doc. No. 19071901.
Read more...19 July 2019
Companies seeking H-1B workers are being asked to prove they’ll have definite assignments for the full three-year term of the visa, the latest hurdle from the administration in its crackdown on the specialty occupation visa program. In some cases, the USCIS is approving H-1Bs for shorter periods of time, depending on what the employer can […]
Read more...17 July 2019
