Employers and noncitizen workers in Silicon Valley have just gotten some good news from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Earlier in May, USCIS announced a huge, temporary increase in the automatic extension of employment authorization and their Employment...
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Employment Immigration Visas
Changes for the better at USCIS
The Biden Administration recently proposed changes to help reduce the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services backlog. As part of the president's $5.8 trillion budget request to Congress, the USCIS under the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would see a...
Biden signs EB-5 visa reforms into law
President Joe Biden signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2022, on March 15. It included the EB-5 Reform and Integrity Act of 2022 (RIA), which makes sweeping changes to EB-5. These include: · It reauthorizes and extends the Regional Center (RC) program to...
New documentation rules help with E and L spouses’ employment authorization
We recently wrote that the United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) changed the admission codes for the I-94s of spouses of E and L visa holders. This change automatically authorizes immigrant spouses of valid E and L visa holders to work legally. The CBP...
There are new admission codes for E and L directive spouses
The United States Customs and Border Protection ("CBP") changed the admission codes for I-94s of spouses of E and L-1 visa holders. Originally announced on November 11, 2021, the new codes reflect immigration policy changes resulting from a lawsuit against the...
It is time to start the H1-B visa process
It’s H-1B cap season again, which means employers should now identify current foreign national employees or foreign candidates they would like to hire and sponsor for an H1-B visa. H1-B Lottery details As with most other visa categories, there is a cap on the number...
Application window for 2023 H1-B is about to open
The United States Customs and Immigration Services held three lotteries for the fiscal year 2022. The total acceptance rate was 42.7% of the 308,613 applications submitted. The number of applications has increased by 54% in just three years. Now, the process will soon...
USCIS updates guidance for O-1 applicants
The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) released new guidelines on the eligibility of O-1A nonimmigrants of extraordinary ability. This information notably pertains to applicants from the so-called STEM fields of science, technology,...
The USCIS held another H-1B lottery
There was recently good news from the United States Customs and Immigration Services (USCIS). On Friday, November 19, the agency announced that it held a third H-1B visa cap lottery for the Fiscal Year 2022. The applicants needed to do nothing – the agency selected...
Automatic 180-Day Extensions for H-4, E, and L-2 dependent spouses
An automatic extension for many is now in effect There is new I-9 verification for dependent spouse EADs (H-4, E, and L) who file to renew their EAD. The dependent spouses all automatically qualify for 180-day extensions or employment authorization related to status...