Immigration in the News  

March 25, 2008

Immigrant-worker visas could double if new bill passes

Immigrant-worker visas could double if new bill passes

USCIS Announces Interim Rule on H-1B Visas

(courtesy of AILA INfonet, Mar 19, 2008--emphasis added--This Rule was published in the Federal Register: March 24, 2008 (Volume 73, Number 57); this represents a change over last years H-1b filing policy in CIS accepting of H-1b applications over a 5 day period before cutting off further applications -dk)
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 U.S. Tweaks Proposal On Illegal  Workers, Employers Could  Get    Warnings In June (article  courtesy of Washington Post, Mar 22-- A 30 Day Period Follows Before the Rule is Made Permanent-DK)

 
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February 29, 2008

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) instructs "panel physicians" designated in other countries for conducting medical examinations of immigrants to the U.S. in coordination with consular immigrant visa processing. In late 2007, CDC announced two changes for these medical exams.

First, CDC appears to have changed the vaccination requirements for all applicants examined abroad by panel physicians as follows:

• Rotavirus vaccine, hepatitis A vaccine, meningococcal vaccine, human papillomavirus vaccine, and zoster vaccine have been added as age-appropriate to the vaccination requirements.
• Hepatitis B vaccine is required through 18 years of age.
• Influenza vaccine is required for children ages 6-59 months.
• Acellular pertussis-containing vaccines have been developed for persons ages 10-64 years.

Other significant changes to the immigration vaccination requirements are?

• Rotavirus vaccine should be given orally to children 2 through 6 months of age.
• Hepatitis A vaccine should be given to children 12 through 23 months of age.
• Meningococcal conjugate vaccine, specifically tetravalent meningococcal conjugate vaccine (MCV4) should be given to persons 11 through 18 years of age.
• Meningococcal polysaccharide vaccine (MPSV) or other forms of meningococcal conjugate vaccine (e.g., monovalent MCV) is an acceptable alternative if MCV4 is not available.
• Human papillomavirus vaccine should be given to females 11 through 26 years of age.
• Zoster vaccine should be given to persons 60 years of age or older.
• Hepatitis B vaccine should be given from birth through 18 years of age.
• Influenza vaccine should be given annually to children 6 through 59 months of age. It continues to be required for adults 50 years of age or older.
• Acellular pertussis-containing vaccines are available for use in persons at least 10 years of age. The adolescent and adult formulation of tetanus and diphtheria toxoid and acellular pertussis (Tdap) vaccine is given as a single (booster) dose for persons 10 through 64 years of age who have completed the recommended childhood diphtheria and tetanus toxoids and the pertussis/diphtheria and tetanus toxoids and acellular pertussis (DTP/DTaP) vaccine series.

For details, see the CDC’s 2007 Technical Instructions for Vaccinations

In addition, CDC has concluded that the 1991 system currently in effect misses applicants with smear-negative but culture-positive tuberculosis, as well as tuberculosis in applicants <15 years of age, and fails to provide clear standards for treatment of applicants with TB. Thus, CDC is phasing in, beginning with 8 countries deemed most important, the following new procedures carried out by panel physicians:

Tuberculin skin tests (TST) for applicants <15 years of age in countries with a World Health Organization (WHO)-estimated tuberculosis incidence rate >20 per 100,000.

• All applicants <15 years of age with TST =5 mm will be required to have a chest radiograph.
• Mycobacterial cultures for applicants with chest radiographs suggestive of tuberculosis disease.
• Treatment under a directly observed therapy (DOT) program.
• Completion of treatment prior to immigrating to the United States, according to American Thoracic Society/CDC/Infectious Diseases Society of America guidelines.
• New TB classifications for all applicants with suspected latent Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection and for contacts for cases of tuberculosis disease.

January 14, 2008

Agency Acts to Cut Delay in Gaining Citizenship

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I-140s for Expiring Labor Certs. Must be Received Friday, 1/11/08 November 25, 2007

Revised Rule for Employers That Hire Immigrants

The Bush administration will suspend its legal defense of a new rule issued in August to punish employers who hire illegal immigrants, conceding a hard-fought opening round in a court battle over a central measure in its strategy to curb illegal immigration, according to government papers filed late Friday in federal court.

Instead, the administration plans to revise the rule to try to meet concerns raised by a federal judge and issue it again by late March, hoping to pass court scrutiny on the second try. The rule would have forced employers to fire workers within 90 days if their Social Security information could not be verified.

The government’s proposal was a response to an indefinite delay to the rule ordered Oct. 10 by the judge, Charles R. Breyer of Federal District Court in San Francisco. Judge Breyer found that the government had failed to follow proper procedures in issuing the rule and that it should have completed a survey of its impact on small business.

He also found that the Social Security database the government would use to verify workers’ status was full of errors, so the rule could lead to the dismissal of many thousands of workers who were American citizens or legal immigrants.

In a four-page motion filed Friday, the government, without acknowledging any flaws in the original rule, asked Judge Breyer to suspend the case so the Department of Homeland Security could rewrite the rule and conduct the small-business survey, which it expects to do by March 24. The government said that it wanted to “prevent the waste of judicial resources” and that it was confident the amended rule would “fully address the court’s concerns.”

Homeland Security officials said they were not abandoning the rule and were still considering an appeal of Judge Breyer’s ruling. For now they are “planning to provide an answer to the small number of minor issues that the judge raised in his opinion,” Laura Keehner, a spokeswoman for the department, said.

The legal challenge was brought by an odd-fellow alliance of labor unions and business groups, including the A.F.L.-C.I.O. and the San Francisco Labor Council as well as the United States Chamber of Commerce.

“It’s clear the government has given up defending an indefensible rule,” said Lucas Guttentag, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, another group bringing the lawsuit. “But now they’re hoping to rush through another half-baked rule without addressing the fundamental flaws. It’s like putting lipstick on Frankenstein.”

The rule laid out procedures for employers to follow after receiving a notice from the Social Security Administration, known as a no-match letter, advising that an employee’s identity information did not match the agency’s records.

The employer would have had to fire an employee who could not provide verifiable information within 90 days, or face the risk of prosecution for knowingly hiring illegal immigrants. Those immigrants often present fake Social Security numbers when applying for jobs.

Judge Breyer also stopped Social Security from sending out about 141,000 no-match letters, covering more than eight million workers, which contained instructions from Homeland Security about the rule. Social Security sends the letters to clarify workers’ information so it can correctly credit taxes deducted from their wages.

Some businesses welcomed the rule because it clarified what they had to do to avoid immigration raids. But the labor unions cited a report from the inspector general of the Social Security Administration finding that 12.7 million of the records of United States citizens in the agency’s database contained errors that could lead to them being fired. (article courtesy of from New York Times)

(It is likely that we will see a very similar Rule proposed by the government very soon--This is just the first round--DK)

November 21, 2007

Long wait expected to become US citizen. Delays spur concern over voting eligibility.

Immigrants will face a significantly longer wait to become US citizens because applications surged more than expected before hefty fee increases took effect July 30, Boston's chief immigration official said yesterday.

The delay has raised concern among immigrant advocacy groups that thousands of immigrants might not be eligible to vote in the 2008 presidential elections because they must be US citizens to go to the polls. It has also stirred anxiety among immigrants who are still awaiting word from the government.

Nationally, 784,601 people applied for citizenship before the fees increased this year, compared with 458,964 during the same period the previous year, a 71 percent jump, according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services. Denis Riordan, Boston's district director for the agency, said "processing time will increase and increase, to be frank, significantly."

It is too soon to know how long the process will take, he said, partly because thousands of applications are still sitting in boxes. But he said it will certainly take longer than the current seven months, both in Boston and nationwide. In January, it took four to five months to become a citizen in Boston.

Riordan said national officials are scrambling to come up with a plan to minimize the delays, from offering overtime to hiring more employees.

In Boston, he was already planning to add at least eight officers to a 40-person staff handling these and other cases. Each officer can handle as many as 1,600 citizenship cases a year.

"We are not going to stand by and let that backlog increase significantly," Riordan said. "Whatever it takes to get the job done, we are prepared to do."

But the delays are already unleashing a wave of uncertainty across the region. Immigrants had rushed to beat the fee hikes, which rose from $400 to $675, and then heard nothing for months.

Now they are calling help lines, scouring their bank statements to see whether the government has cashed their checks, and shuffling through their mail for letters from the government. Some worry that their applications are lost.

"Some applicants are nervous because they would have expected to have received the notification for an interview at this point, and have not," said Thomas Keown, spokesman for the Irish Immigration Center in Boston. "It's a stressful process for people anyway, but with a delay of this size they get more nervous."

Immigrants are especially concerned about missing out on the 2008 elections, according to advocates. Immigration has become a pivotal issue in the upcoming election, with presidential candidates clashing over what to do about the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in this country.

Immigrants must be legal residents to apply for citizenship. But many citizens and noncitizens alike rallied in recent years to seek change in immigration law, holding signs at local demonstrations such as "today we march, tomorrow we vote."

"The longer a person takes to become a citizen, the fewer voters you have on the rolls," said Ali Noorani, executive director of the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition. "When we're faced with a national election that determines the next president, the last thing we should be doing is keeping people from voting."

Patricia Montes is a coordinator of community organizers with Centro Presente, a Cambridge-based nonprofit that helps immigrants apply for citizenship. Montes applied to become a citizen just before the fee increase.

She said she only received her appointment to be fingerprinted a few weeks ago, and she is worried that she won't be eligible to vote.

"More than anything I want to vote," said Montes, a journalist with a college degree who arrived from Honduras four years ago. "I believe in democracy. I have few opportunities to participate in the civic life of this country without being a citizen."

Riordan said the agency would try to work quickly, "with or without a national election coming up."

To apply for citizenship, immigrants must fill out an application, pay the fee, be interviewed and tested, and undergo background checks. Applicants must be legal residents for five years, have a basic command of English, and adhere to the US Constitution. Finally, they must attend a swearing-in ceremony.

In raising the fees, the government was seeking to raise an additional $1 billion to improve services and cover costs for the US Citizenship and Immigration Services, which processes 6 million to 8 million immigration-related applications a year, from work authorizations to asylum and legal permanent residency, called green cards.

But immigration officials said the agency is being buffeted by a "perfect storm," including an average 66 percent increase in agency fees and a federal decision to increase the number of people who could apply for green cards through work, which deluged their office with 800,000 unexpected applications.

The magnitude of the increase in applications caught immigration officials off guard, Riordan said. The fee increases were announced in February, though the final costs weren't released until May.

"We've had fee increases in the past," he said. "But this surge is unprecedented. Maybe people are more aware of the immigration debate and the importance of citizenship," Riordan said.(article courtesy of Boston Globe)

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(It is likely that  we will not see a return to the four or five month waiting period in naturalization cases that we saw at the end of 2006--dk)

November 2, 2007

H-1B Fee Increase and Recapture of Green Cards Provisions Stricken from Conference Report

On 11/01/07, during a conference between House and Senate conferees to reconcile differences between their respective versions of the Labor-HHS-Education (H.R. 3043) and the Military Construction-VA (H.R. 2642) appropriations measures, two major provisions have been reportedly stricken although no text of the conference report will be available until November 5.
The conferees have stricken that provision from the conference report which woul d have more than tripled the H-1b filing fee. In a related action, the conferees also removed the amendment added by the Senate that would have recaptured unused green cards for schedule A occupations. Note that a presidential veto threat still looms over this -conference report. (adapted from AILA innfonet by DK)

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It is obviously critical that we maintain reasonable H-1b filing fees in order that we remain competitive in the high tech global economy. --dk

 

November 1, 2007

New I-9 Form IS Imminent

AILA Liaison has been advised that DHS has decided to move forward with a new I-9 form and employer handbook at this time, perhaps as early as the week of November 5. Instead of publishing a new regulation now, which we understand had been the original plan, DHS will go forward now with an I-9 based on the 1997/98 regulations, and then will publish a new regulation, with a newer I-9 form, in 2008.

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Given the trend towards the enforcement end of Immigration Law, we are likely to see more I-9 audits and a further tightening of I-9 regulations going forward--DK

October 24, 2007

Two Immigration Measures  Passed in Senate as Part of HHS Appropiations Bill

On the evening of 10-23-07, during debate on the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 2008 (H.R. 3043) two significant immigration-related amendments were passed by voice vote.

The Grassley-Sanders amendment (H.ADMT. 3396), as modified, was added to H.R. 3043. The amendment would add an additional fee of $3,500 to the H-1B visa program which would be used to create a special education fund to promote studies in the fields of math, science and engineering.

Also passed by a voice vote during the debate was the Schumer-Hutchison amendment (H.AMDT. 3404) to increase the domestic supply of nurses and physical therapists by recapturing unused green cards from the years 1996 and 1997. Before the Schumer-Hutchison amendment was passed, it was amended by a Durbin second-degree amendment (H.AMDT. 3449) which attempts to increase the number of nursing faculty and students in the United States, encourages global health care cooperation, and creates a $1,500 fee for a recaptured green card from the underlying amendment. The Durbin amendment also requires that the petitioning healthcare worker attest that he or she has satisfied any outstanding commitment to work in his or her home country.

While these amendments have been incorporated into the Senate’s version of the Labor-HHS appropriations bill, this version must now be reconciled with the House’s version of the bill which does not contain these provisions. A conference between House and Senate members to reconcile the differences has yet to be scheduled. There is also the possibility that this bill will be combined with other appropriation bills as part of an omnibus package. President Bush has also threatened a veto of this bill because it exceeds the budget he outlined by almost $9 billion creating additional uncertainty for the fate of this bill.

Since the above amendments were passed in the Senate only they have yet to be addressed in the House after which their difference would have to be resolved in conference. It remains to be seen if, at the end of the session, either of these two measures remain in tact.-Debbi Klopman

Senate Rejects The Dream Bill In a 52-44 Cloture Vote 

The Senate today rejected a bill that would have allowed young people brought to the United States as children by their illegal immigrant parents to gain legal status provided they attended school or entered the military.

The 52-44 vote, short of the 60 required, was seen as a test of the Senate's appetite for pursuing an immigration overhaul on a piecemeal basis, as opposed to the comprehensive approach that failed this summer. The procedural vote would have allowed debate to begin.

"I believe in this bill passionately," said lead sponsor Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), who has lobbied for the so-called Dream Act for five years and says he knows many young people who would be helped by it. "Some of their stories are heartbreaking. Many know no other country, know no other language, and now they are being told to leave by our government."

The Dream Act would give conditional legal status to illegal immigrants who have lived in the U.S. at least five years and entered the country before age 16. They must graduate from high school, have no criminal record and have a "good moral character." Provided the students completed two years of higher education or service in the military, the conditional basis of the legal status would be lifted. After five years, they could apply for citizenship.

Estimates vary as to the number of young illegal immigrants the bill would affect. The Congressional Budget Office has put it at fewer than 100,000, while the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute has estimated it at closer to 500,000.

Democrats argued there was a moral imperative to pass the bill, saying that skilled graduates would benefit American business and that the young people who enlisted would provide a much-needed boost to a military struggling to meet recruitment goals.

"Children should not be penalized for the actions of their parents," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.). "Many of the children this bill addresses came here when they were very young. Many don't even remember their home countries or speak the language of their home countries. They are just as loyal and devoted to our country as any American."

Republicans objected both to the timing of the bill and to its substance. Some complained that the Senate had several spending bills to process and should not be debating a controversial immigration measure.

"We've yet to send a single appropriations bill," said Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

Noting that the Internet tax moratorium expired in "exactly one week" and that 50 million taxpayers could become ensnared in a confusing tangle if Congress did not address the average minimum tax, McConnell said, "We have an enormous amount of work and we're running out of time."

Others, like Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), said the bill was flawed, citing the fact that Dream Act beneficiaries would not be required to graduate college with a degree.

Some who had been supportive of the measure when Durbin brought it up on previous occasions were unenthusiastic. "Even though there's merit in the goal of the Dream Act, I feel this should be part of a comprehensive approach," said Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.).

Conservative groups aggressively attacked the bill as an "amnesty" that would provoke a storm of public outrage, as happened the last time the Senate took up the issue of immigration reform.

"This is amnesty," said Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.). "It's a slap in the face to all of those who came in here legally."

Noting the public uproar over previous attempts by the Senate to reform immigration, Inhofe added: "When do we learn? All of America's awake on this one. They know exactly what we're doing."

Durbin countered that Dream Act beneficiaries would have very limited ability to sponsor family members to come to the U.S. and that his bill would not allow them to get in-state tuition or federal aid. And he implored the Senate not to ignore the talents and patriotism of children whose only crime was to pack their suitcases when their parents told them the family was leaving.

"Don't tell me tomorrow you need HB-1 visas because we need more talented people," he said to his Senate colleagues. "Give these children a chance."
(synopsis taken from the Los Angeles Times)
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After this summer’s much publicized failed attempt at Comprehensive Immigration Reform, the DREAM Act was the first stand alone bill to test the viability of  piecemeal immigration reform. Early yesterday, before the Senate vote, the White House published its firm opposition to the Act which, as discussed above was later voted down in a cloture vote---Debbi Klopman