New legislation has been introduced in the United States Senate to grant unused immigrant visas to foreign healthcare professionals to help fight the coronavirus. The Senate bill would authorize up to 25,000 immigrant visas for foreign nurses and up to 15,000 for foreign doctors. The legislation would also allow the
United States President Donald Trump’s Executive Order (“EO”) banning certain immigrants from immigrating may end up increasing the number of visas available for employment-based immigrant visa categories. Employment-based immigrant visas are capped at 140,000 worldwide per fiscal year while family-based immigrant visas are limited to roughly 250,000 per year. The
The first group of litigants have filed a Temporary Restraining Order (“TRO”) against U.S. President Donald Trump’s Immigration Ban. The TRO petition, which was filed in the U.S. Federal District Court in Oregon, seeks an immediate, limited order to protect family-based preference immigrants under the age of 21 from being
The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) has announced that in-person services at its offices will reopen as early as June 4th in compliance with local and state orders. In-person services at USCIS include field offices, asylum offices, and application support centers. During this extended closure period, USCIS will
The United States Immigration and Citizenship Services (“USCIS”) has published its quarterly performance data for Form I-526, Immigrant Petition by Alien Investor and Form I-829, Petition by Entrepreneurs to Remove Conditions on Permanent Resident Status. The number of I-526 petition filings are not much of a surprise and the painfully
A K-3 visa is a non-immigrant visa issued to a foreign spouse married to a U.S. citizen. Like a K-1 visa, a K-3 visa is also filed using a Form I-129F Petition for Alien Fiancé(e) (“Form I-129F Petition”) intended to shorten the separation period between the married couple and allow
There has always been a challenge with some U.S. government offices incorrectly listing Vietnamese citizen’s names on government documents such as visas and Form I-551 “Green Cards” because Vietnamese passports list names in order of last name (or “family name” or “surname”) followed by middle name then first name. This
Five years ago, USCIS routinely took three months to issue employment authorization documents (EADs) and advance parole (AP) travel documents. Prior to the pandemic, USCIS was taking approximately six months to issue them. Now, USCIS can take nine months or longer to issue these documents. These delays create huge hardships to organizations
Pursuant to a Biden Administration initiative, on January 21, 2022, the Departments of State (“DOS”) and Homeland Security (“DHS”) announced new actions related to STEM work authorization, J-1 Researchers, National Interest Waivers, and O-1 Extraordinary Ability Workers. You can read the White House Fact Sheet here. “The Biden-Harris Administration believes
On January 5, 2022, the Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”), on behalf of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”), filed a motion to dismiss its appeal of a U.S. District Court’s ruling in the case Behring Regional Center LLC v. Alejandro N. Mayorkas, et al. (“Behring v. Alejandro”).
Six months have passed since the EB-5 Regional Center Program (“Program”) expired and Congress has still not taken any steps towards its renewal. Originally enacted in 1993, the Program was a pilot, or test, program and was never made permanent. The Program had been extended on a regular basis for
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