2014 Global Mobility & Immigration Award Winners Announced!
The online magazine, “Acquisition International” has announced the winners of the, “2014 Global Mobility & Immigration Awards”. I’m proud to announce that for 2014, MVP Law Group, P.A. has won the “Best Law Firm for Temporary Visas – USA“.
Since 2010, Acquisition International Magazine’s annual awards have been celebrating excellence, innovation and performance across the business, legal, financial and investment communities.
The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will be holding a stakeholder teleconference on Thursday, August 14, 2014 between 1:30 to 2:30pm (EST). The subject of the event will be a “Dialogue with USCIS Director León Rodríguez” and will include his introduction and a Q&A session. León Rodríguez was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in June and sworn in on July 9, 2014, as the new director of USCIS. For more information on this teleconference please review the Meeting Invitation.
Event Information:
DATE: Thursday, August 14, 2014 TIME: 1:30 – 2:30 pm (EST)
Processing Time reports for all of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) Service Centers were released on 8/7/14 with processing dates as of 6/30/14.
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.
This is an excerpt from MVP Law Group’s July 2014 Immigration Newsletter, our Managing Attorney, Kellie Lego‘s monthly greeting/commentary.
I recently attended the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) annual conference in Boston, MA from June 18 – June 21 attended by over 3,000 Immigration Attorneys across the U.S. In our July 2013 newsletter (my report following last year’s annual conference), I was delighted to be able to report on the status of DACA filings and the Supreme Court of the United States ruling where they declared Section 3 of DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional. At that time, huge strides were being made in the Immigration realm. As I write this newsletter greeting a year later, I am appalled by our Congressional Representatives failure to act.
On June 27, 2013, the Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR) was passed by the U.S. Senate. Although the legislation is not perfect, it is a compromise, a compromise that is long overdue and very much needed. To date, the House has not acted on CIR nor do they intend to do so. If anything, they have stated that they will create their own immigration reform through piecemeal legislation, focusing on border enforcement first…yet, with the recent unaccompanied minor crisis at our Southern Border, they still have failed to act.
On July 23, 2014, a 32 year old Jamaican national, Nerene Erica Harrison was convicted in Federal Court (Tampa, FL) of Marriage Fraud under U.S. Immigration Law. Robert Kenneth Scott Cruz, a U.S. citizen who pleaded guilty of the same charge, was paid $6,000 to marry her after her temporary work visa expired. They were married in August of 2011 and Harrison applied to be a lawful permanent resident based on that marriage. Both Harrison and Cruz face a maximum penalty of five years in federal prison. Harrison will be sentenced on October 23, 2014 and Cruz will be sentenced on November 11, 2014.
Susan L. McCormick, Special Agent in Charge of Homeland Security Investigations for Tampa, FL stated, “Every marriage fraud scheme corrupts the integrity and fairness of our nation’s immigration system”.
Source of Information:
USA Today has put together an interactive map of the United States (state by state) showing the number of unaccompanied immigrant children placed within individual states. They are using the data released by the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement showing a state-by-state breakdown of the number of unaccompanied immigrant minors who had been released temporarily to different sponsors. The data used for this report and the interactive map covers the time period from 1/1/14 to 7/7/14. The interactive map has three categories: (1) Below 100, (2) 100 to 999 and (3) More than 1,000. To view the Map please follow this link: Where unaccompanied immigrant children find a temporary home.
The top three states accepting these children are:
Texas – 4,280
On Wednesday, July 23, 2014, Congresswoman Kay Granger (R-TX), the Chairwoman of the GOP House Working Group on national security and humanitarian crisis at the southern border released their recommendations and solutions. Granger stated, “This morning, I presented to the House GOP Conference the recommendations of Speaker Boehner’s working group. I am proud of the set of recommendations and solutions that the working group has crafted over the last few weeks. These recommendations reflect the immediate crisis this country faces by providing common-sense, compassionate, but tough solutions.”
The working group which was setup by Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) includes the following members:
Processing Time reports for all of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) Service Centers were released on 7/17/14 with processing dates as of 5/31/14.
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.
On Wednesday, July 9, 2014, Leon Rodriguez was sworn in as the next Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). USCIS is a federal government agency with nearly 18,000 employees. They are responsible for administering the country’s immigration and naturalization system. USCIS is under the control of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Director Rodriguez stated, “Our role in administering our nation’s immigration and naturalization laws has never been more important. I look forward to working with the entire USCIS family, including our partners and constituents, to ensure that our mission is carried out with fairness and integrity.”
Director Rodriguez previously served as the Director of the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from 2011 to 2014. For more detailed information on his background please review the link, “Background Experience/Significant Achievements”.
MVP Law Group would like to congratulate Director Rodriguez and wish him great success! USCIS has shown great innovation in improvement of customer service and the use of technology for data collection! We here at MVP Law Group hope that this culture of innovation continues and grows under the new Director’s leadership!
Processing Time reports for all of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) Service Centers were released on 7/8/14 with processing dates as of 5/31/14.
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.
H1B Visa Lawyer Blog