Month: September 2011

USCIS has officially asked for public comments on a new, proposed rule
that would give the federal agency the power to process certain EB-5
Immigrant Investor visa applications that were approved between 1995 and
1998. This proposed rule would apply to the group of immigrant
investors who received approval of their Forms I-526, the Immigration
Petition by Alien Entrepreneur, between January 1, 1995, and August 31,
1998.

The rule would enable USCIS to process roughly 580 applications from
immigrant investors and their dependents who received approved Forms
I-526 during the stated time period and who, before November 2, 2002,
wished to register for permanent residence or adjust status, or remove
conditions on permanent residence obtained as an alien entrepreneur.

The U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration
has announced a 60-day postponement of the revision of wage calculations
for the H-2B visa program for temporary nonagricultural workers. This
delay will allow various courts that are involved in litigation related
to the implementation of the rule the chance to determine the best venue
to find resolutions for claims, as well as ensure that the H-2B program
can be administered without potentially conflicting court orders.

The effective date of the rule has been moved from September 30, 2011,
to November 30, 2011. This change will be published in the Federal
Register next week. A final rule was published on January 19, , that
revised the wage methodology for the H-2B program.

On September 9, 2011, USCIS posted an update regarding the amount of
applications received for standard cap-subject and master’s exemption
H-1B visas for Fiscal Year 2012. According to USCIS, a total of 16,700
H-1B Master’s Exemption visas have been filed, and 32,200 standard cap
visas have been filed. Each fiscal year, a total of 20,000 master’s
exempt H-1B visas are available; up to 65,000 standard cap visas are
available.

USCIS began accepting petitions for H-1B visas for Fiscal Year 2012
(starting on October 1, 2011) on April 1, 2011. Petitions may be filed
no more than six months in advance of the requested start date. Please
note that up to 6,800 visas from the 65,000 cap-subject visas are set
aside each fiscal year for the H-1B1 program.

The Department of State has just posted an urgent notice to USCIS
offices that no Employment Preference Cases for the remainder of Fiscal
Year 2011 remain. According to the Department of State, there has been
an extremely large amount of demand and processing of Employment
preference cases for this fiscal year and the FY-2011 Employment annual
limit has now been reached.

Numbers will again be available for all Employment categories on October
1, 2011 and will be limited by the FY-2012 annual numerical limitations
for each category.

The Department of State has announced that the online registration
period for the 2013 Diversity Visa Program, DV-2013, will begin on
Tuesday, October 4 at noon EST, and will end on Saturday, November 5 at
noon EST. The Diversity Immigrant Visa Program makes up to 55,000
diversity visas available each year. These visas are given to people
from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States who
meet certain eligibility requirements. Visas are selected randomly from
all eligible applicants who correctly submit their visas within the open
registration period.

People selected for the Diversity Visa must have at least a high school
education or its equivalent, or two years of work experience within the
past five years in an occupation that requires at least two years of
training or experience. Learn more about the Diversity Visa Lottery
Program at travel.state.gov.

A new plan will give annual visas to up to 500,000 foreign national farm
workers, but many U.S. farm owners do not think the bill provides
enough support for their industry. The new bill, written by the
conservative Texas Republican Senator, Lamar Smith, proposes to move the
H-2A visa program from the Labor Department to the Agriculture
Department, streamline the application process for growers and ease many
requirements for growers.

However, many in the U.S. House of Representatives, including Rep. Zoe
Lofgren (D-CA) are not fans of the proposal. Lofgren says that the bill
proposes to slash wages and worker protections in favor of growers, and
creates incentives for U.S.-based growers to get rid of domestic workers
in exchange for cheaper, foreign labor. California growers currently do
not regularly use the H-2A visa program and many in the state have been
supporting a program called AgJobs, which would give legal status to up
to 1.5 million illegal immigrant farm workers, something Smith’s
proposal does not do.

Earlier this week, USCIS published a final rule that establishes a
Transitional Worker classification (the CW classification) for workers
in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI). This new
classification will now allow employers in the CNMI to hire nonimmigrant
workers who would otherwise not be eligible to work.

A specific amount of CW visas will be available each fiscal year and
will be based on the CNMI government’s estimate of nonresident workers.
In FY 2011, that number is 22,417; in FY 2012, it will be 22, 416. This
limitation, according to the final rule, must drop each year; the
Department of Homeland Security will determine this yearly limitation
for fiscal year.

On October 1, U.S. Embassies in Copenhagen, Denmark, and Oslo, Norway
will no longer process immigrant or diversity visa applications. After
that date, neither of these embassies will schedule nor conduct
interviews for these applications. All immigrant and diversity visa
interviews and adjudications for residents of Denmark, Norway and Sweden
will instead take place at the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm Sweden.

The Copenhagen and Oslo embassies will continue to process all cases
that are currently in process up to December 31, 2011.After that date,
all pending immigration and diversity visa cases will be transferred to
the Stockholm Embassy. These two agencies will continue to offer some
immigration-related services, but these services will be limited. Please
note that the embassies will, however, continue to process nonimmigrant
visas for area residents.