Read our June 2018 newsletter, with articles about USCIS’ new policy impacting foreign student overstays; an anticipated proposal to rescind employment authorization for spouses of H-1b employees; the FY2019 H-1b lottery; a USCIS -Justice Depar…
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USCIS announced that it had exhausted the supplemental allotment of 15,000 seasonal worker visas authorized by DHS in May 2018. USCIS received sufficient employer petitions seeking the supplemental allotment within 5 days of the opening of the filing…
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USCIS is no longer accepting escalations after 75 days for delayed applications for employment authorization. The 75-day policy had been in place when regulations required USCIS to adjudicate employment authorization applications within 90 days of fi…
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USCIS has announced that it is extending to 18 months the time during which an I-751 receipt notice may be used in conjunction with an expired conditional permanent resident card to evidence continuing permanent resident status. The prior policy only…
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On May 17, 2018, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that immigration courts are barred from authorizing indefinite administrative closure of removal proceedings against non-citizens that Homeland Security seeks to deport. This is a stunning reb…
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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) stated in a May 2018 court filing that it plans to imminently publish a proposal to rescind its regulation permitting employment authorization for spouses of H-1B workers with approved permanent resident peti…
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Several IT staffing companies have sued DHS in New Jersey federal court, seeking to block implementation of a February 2018 USCIS H-1b policy memorandum requiring substantially more documentation of need where an employer’s seeks to assign H-1b wor…
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The travel ban affecting citizens of Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela, and Yemen has been in full effect since December 2017, but waivers of the ban necessitated by, e.g., undue hardship or the absence of national security concer…
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On April 11, 2018, USCIS completed its random selection process of H-1b cap petitions for FY 2019. USCIS received a total of 190,098 petitions, of which 94, 213 were filed for the 65,000 available regular cap visas, and 95,885 petitions were filed fo…
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The Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division and USCIS have signed an agreement “that expands their collaboration to better detect and eliminate fraud, abuse, and discrimination by employers bringing foreign visa workers to the United States…
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