The United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) has updated the count of H-1B petitions received and counted towards the 65,000 cap.
As of November 19, 2010, 48,977 H-1B Regular CAP subject non-immigrant visa petitions have been filed with the USCIS towards the 65,000 cap.
As of November 19, 2010, 17,836 H-1B Masters Degree CAP subject non-immigrant visa petitions have been filed with the USCIS towards the 20,000 cap.
The Form I-129 has been revised by the United States Immigration and Citizenship Service (USICIS) which allows employers to petition for temporary workers under a variety of nonimmigrant visa classifications. Publication of the revisions by USCIS will be available on November 23, 2010.
For 30 days after the publication of the new version or until December 21, 2010, USCIS will accept previous versions of the Form I-129.
Beginning December 22, 2010, USCIS will only be accepting the revised Form I-129 and will decline any request filed with previous versions of the form.
After an investigation lead by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Office of Homeland Security Investigations (HIS), George Anagnostou of Maryland, was sentenced on October 28 to four months in prison and another four months on house arrest with electronic monitoring. Anagnostou also faces two years of supervised release after serving his sentence. His charges consisted of harboring at least 24 illegal workers of the Timbuktu and By the Docks restaurants. As a part of his sentencing, Anagnostou was forced to give up his motorcycle, pay a sum of $378,386.21 from five different bank accounts, give up $99,890 from the restaurant and his house, as well as an additional pay $256,696.67 at his court hearing.
From 2000 to 2005, Anagnostou was in charge of hiring employees for both Timbuktu and By the Docks restaurants. Other than collecting two documents, Anagnostou never made any other efforts to verify the authority of an individual to work in the United States, like using the required Employment Eligibility Verification forms (I-9s). Even when informed that many of his applicants had presented him with falsified forms, he insisted that his employees stop asking questions and accept the documents. In addition, the Social Security Administration began notifying Anagnostou that the Social Security numbers he was supplying for his employees did not match up in the database but he still did nothing to validate the legitimacy of his workers.
Anagnostou benefited financially from the illegal workers employment at the restaurants because he deducted their rental payments from their overtime wages due, paid them in cash preventing him from being subject to tax liability and he didn’t claim the rental property on his income taxes.
After pleading guilty to harboring and concealing illegal aliens on November 11, Arkansas resident Sen Chen was sentenced to five years probation, six months house arrest, a $5,000 fine and a $100 special assessment. As a part of his sentencing, Chen also forfeited his restaurant, house, and car. The investigation of Chen led by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Office of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agents discovered he was providing illegal immigrants with transportation, food, housing and money in exchange for working at his restaurant.
According to ICE HSI special agent Raymond Parmer this case, “serves as a stern reminder about the consequences facing employers who exploit illegal alien labor.”
Processing Time reports for all of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) Service Centers were released on November 18, 2010 with processing dates as of September 30, 2010.
If you filed a petition with one of the Service Centers, please review the links below to determine the applicable processing time associated with your particular case.
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Question #1 – Employment Based Immigration, Green Card
My case was filed in Oct 2005 and it is current and still waiting. I tried opening Service Request and took InfoPass as well. I got InfoPass appt yesterday in local VA office. They were not able to tell me about my case only that it is still under review at the local Baltimore office where it was transferred to in August 2009. Please let me know what I need to do?
The United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) has updated the count of H-1B petitions received and counted towards the 65,000 cap.
As of November 12, 2010, 47,800 H-1B Regular CAP subject non-immigrant visa petitions have been filed with the USCIS towards the 65,000 cap.
As of November 12, 2010, 17,400 H-1B Masters Degree CAP subject non-immigrant visa petitions have been filed with the USCIS towards the 20,000 cap.
After alleged immigration related employment discrimination charges were investigated by the Office of Special Counsel (OSC) against Catholic Healthcare West (CHW), a voluntary settlement was reached between the Department of Justice (DOJ) and CHW.
During the investigation , the OSC determined that there was “reasonable cause” to suggest that CHW required immigrant workers to provide additional documentation than required by law while they let U.S. citizens choose which documents they wanted to submit. Some of the agreements made under the settlement included CHW paying OSC $1,000, a civil penalty of $257,000 from CHW to the US Treasury, a required I-9 review of all CHW’s both naturalized and immigrant employees by August 1, CHW establishing review teams, and CHW being required to provide OSC with reports tracking the progress and status of its reviews. In addition to the requirements, CHW created specific timelines and instructions on how to carry out each agreement of the settlement. The settlement also required CHW to treat all of its employees fairly and to use non-discriminating hiring practices. The training practices of CHW were updated and revised under the settlement; the employment eligibility verification process and discrimination were especially emphasized.
An amicus brief was filed by the Legal Action Center of the American Immigration Council (LAC) and the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) that argued an H-1B employee should not face arrest, deportation, or detention if he/she has a pending extension request. The reasoning behind the brief is that the employers who follow immigration law and proceedings should not have to lose employees because there are delays at the processing centers. LAC and AILA also argue that arresting individuals undermines the purpose of the H-1B program and includes support from three prominent companies who rely on the work of individuals with H-1B visas in the amicus brief.
The LAC sent the brief on behalf of a Lebanese national whose employer requested an H-1B extension a month before the deadline and paid the $1,000 premium processing fee. The decision was suppose to be received within 15 business days but the government neither sent back an approval or denial of the extension. Seven months after the extension had been requested, there had still been no response and the Lebanese national was arrested for overstaying.
H-1B’s are only granted in three year intervals by the government even though an individual can stay on an H-1B visa for up to six years or longer depending upon the circumstances. An individual is also only allowed to work 240 days after his/her visa expires as long as he/she has filed an extension, after that time period they are subject to arrest.
The Board of Alien Labor Certification Appeals (BALCA) recently affirmed the final determination of a Certifying Officer (CO) denying labor certification for an alien worker for the position of “Chef.”
The applicants’ Employer Application for Permanent Employment Certification was originally accepted by the CO on December 1, 2006 but the application was then denied on December 14 due to the fact that alien did not meet the minimum education, training and experience requirements. The CO issued an audit notification and request for Notice of Filing (NOF) on January 15, 2009 after the Employer asked for a review of the case. On February 11, 2009 the alien’s employer provided all of the information that was questioned in the initial denial as well as the NOF which stated the position was posted from September 1 to September 13. The CO again denied the application on March 16 citing that neither the Employer’s name nor sufficient contact information was provided in the posting. Even though the Employer asked for reconsideration and provided evidence that the posting was sufficient, the CO stuck by the denial. The CO’s main reason for denial was that even though the NOF contained the name and title of the Employer, the information was only added after the initial posting. In the appellate brief filed, the CO reiterated the fact that the information was added to the document after it had already been posted. The CO also mentioned the ambiguity in regards to how many companies resided at that location.
PERM Regulation 20 C.F.R. § 656.10(d) controls and provides that the Employer give notice of filing of the Employer Application for Permanent Employment Certification and that the posting must contain the required information. It is the employer’s responsibility to submit thorough documentation, interpret requests broadly and to be confident that the documentation submitted will support the application. In this case, the Employer’s application did not contain the business name on the NOF and the NOF did not the fully meet all requirements.
H1B Visa Lawyer Blog