Hooray! My Employee's H-1B Visa Was Finally Approved! Now Why Am I Getting This Revocation Notice?
6/19/19
By: Ken Levine For the past two years, USCIS has ramped up revocations of approved H-1B petitions. While there are no reliable government statistics, word of mouth in the immigration legal field, as well as increased federal litigation concerning H-1B revocations, clearly underscores the existence of this trend. Under 8 C.F.R. 214.2(h)(11) USCIS must satisfy…
USCIS Reverses Course – STEM OPT Students May Now Work At 3rd Party Client Sites
9/18/18
By: Ken Levine On August 17th U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) posted an announcement on their website to publicize the agency’s decision to once again allow STEM OPT F-1 students to engage in training programs at a third-party client worksite. This update supersedes the Agency’s policy change in April 2018 which disallowed STEM OPT students…
Foreign Students and Exchange Visitors Beware!
5/15/18
By: Layli Eskandari Deal On May 10, 2018, USCIS published a Policy Memorandum to provide guidance on how the agency will be calculating unlawful presence for F-1, J-1, and M-1 nonimmigrant visa holders and their dependents. Generally, foreign students and exchange visitors are admitted to the United States for “Duration of Status”. This means that…
H-1B Visa Lottery: More Than One Ticket to the Jackpot?
4/5/18
By: Layli Eskandari Deal The answer is No. U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) has adopted a ruling made by the Administrative Appeals Office (AAO) to prohibit multiple H-1B visa request by related entities on behalf of the same beneficiary for the same fiscal year. Under the H-1B visa cap, employers are only allowed to…
Planning To File Your 2018 H-1B Cap Case Under Premium Processing? Not So Fast…
3/27/18
By: Kenneth S. Levine On March 20th USCIS announced an indefinite suspension of the premium processing program for H-1B visa petitions that are subject to the 2018 statutory cap. The annual statutory cap limits the total of H-1B visas that can be approved in any one year to 85,000, 20,000 of which are set aside…
New Developments in TPS and DACA
1/18/18
By: Kenneth S. Levine This past week the Department of Homeland Security announced the termination of Temporary Protected Status for citizens of El Salvador. DHS reports that there are approximately 200,000 El Salvadoran citizens living and working in the United States. TPS designation for El Salvador will officially terminate on September 9, 2019. USCIS has…
The Entrepreneurs Parole Visa – Full Steam Ahead – For Now
12/4/17
By: Kenneth S. Levine On 12/1/2017 a Federal Judge ruled that the Department of Homeland Security did not have legal cause to delay the enactment of a visa program for foreign entrepreneurs. The program, referred to as the “International Entrepreneur Rule,” was supposed to have gone into effect on 07/17/2017. On 7/10/2017 the current presidential…
Update on Temporary Protected Status (TPS) For Citizens of Nicaragua, Honduras, & El Salvador
11/9/17
By Kenneth S. Levine On 11/6/2017 the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued an announcement on the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) program for citizens of Nicaragua and Honduras. Currently, there are approximately 60,000 Nicaraguans and Hondurans who reside and work in the U.S. under the TPS designation. DHS announced that the TPS program for Nicaragua…
10/25/17
By: Kenneth S. Levine For the last several years the EB-5 Green Card program has been widely touted as a relatively quick and direct path to obtaining U.S. Permanent Residency. The program, which grants permanent residency based on a $500,000 minimum investment in USCIS approved regional center projects, has been especially popular in China. According…
Final Rule Extends Optional Practical Training Period for STEM Students
3/15/16
By: Nina Maja Bergmar On March 9, 2016, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued a final rule that extends the Optional Practical Training (OPT) period for so-called “STEM students”—students with degrees in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The OPT program allows foreign students on F-1 student visas to work for up…
1/14/16
By: Nina Maja Bergmar With less than three months left before the FY 2017 filing period, it is high time for employers to start gearing up for this year’s H-1B season. Under the current cap system, the USCIS allots a mere 65,000 visas per year for applicants with a Bachelor’s degree and 20,000 additional visas…
VISA Issues Security Alert Due to Increased Data Breaches Caused by Insecure Remote Access
7/30/14
By: David Cole When a merchant experiences a data breach involving credit card information, it is often required by the card brands to hire a Payment Card Industry Forensic Investigator (PFI). The PFI investigates the incident and then provides a report to the card brands on what happened, how it happened, and whether the merchant’s…