President-Elect Trump announced in a November 21 video (at 1:58) his intent to issue an Executive Order directing the Secretary of Labor to “investigate all abuses of visa programs that undercut the American worker.” Trump offered no elab… Read More

USCIS just issued final rules with many fixes in the skilled worker visa categories. Big stuff. The rules will take effect on January 17, 2017, before the Trump Adminiistration comes into office. Here is a copy of the text of the USCIS Final Order, i… Read More

The State Department’s December 2016 Visa Bulletin projects increased demand for employment based visas in the coming months. State expects to reduce availability of the EB-2 Advanced Degree and Exceptional Ability category “no later than… Read More

THE LATEST EDITION OF OUR NEWSLETTER Our October 2016 newsletter includes stories on: USCIS Filing Fee Increase Labor Department PERM Processing TImes Outlook for Employment-Based Visa Availability Expansion of the Global Entry Program New Procedures… Read More

The Visa Bulletin for June 2016 was released May 6, with significant backward movement to the “final action” cut-off dates for the China and India Employment Based Second and Third Preference categories (EB-2 and EB-3). USCIS usually adopts the V… Read More

USCIS today announced that it will issue employment authorization cards to H-4 spouses of workers in H-1b status who either: 1) are beneficiaries of an approved permanent residence petition but who are awaiting availability of an immigrant visa numbe… Read More

HIGHEST OFFICE OF 1,000 MEMBER CHAPTER OF IMMIGRATION BAR On May 21, 2014, Charles A. Tievsky was elected Chair of the Washington, D.C. Chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) for the 2014-2015 program year. As Chapter Chair, h… Read More

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit recently ruled that the beneficiary of an employment-based immigrant visa petition has an independent legal right to challenge in court USCIS’ denial of the petition, even if the petitioning employer… Read More