Insight, News, and Strategy on Immigration Matters Around the World
On Thursday, August 23, 2012, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that it has published a revised version of the new Form I-9 for comment. The comment period runs through September 21, 2012.
Some of the key revisions to the new form include:
• Maiden Name is changed to Other Names Used
• Includes clarification…
AUTHOR: HARRY J. JOE
Employers that use the H-2B non-immigrant visa program to obtain unskilled workers from outside the U.S. may need to increase their budgets for these workers following a federal judge’s decision upholding the Department of Labor’s authority to issue a new wage order. U.S. District Court Judge Legrome D. Davis has upheld…
A federal appeals court in Atlanta has struck down portions of Georgia’s controversial “Illegal Immigration Reform and Enforcement Act” (H.B. 87) prohibiting the transportation, concealing, or harboring of illegal aliens. Relying heavily on the recent, highly publicized Supreme Court decision in Arizona v. United States, the Circuit Court found that Section 7 of the measure…
United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced that employers should continue using the Form I-9 currently available in the forms section of http://www.uscis.gov until further notice.
All employers should use the form even after August 31, 2012, when the current OMB control number expires. USCIS will provide updated information about the new version…
The U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (WHD) has announced that Semafor Technologies LLC in Norcross, Georgia, has agreed to pay 73 employees $741,288 in back wages following an investigation by the WHD. The June 12, 2012, announcement is the result of an investigation that found the company failed to pay 54 foreign…
The DREAM Act (Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors) is a bipartisan bill that has failed in Congress time and again since its initial proposal in 2001. The basic tenets of the Act would provide conditional temporary residency to certain illegal immigrants if the individuals are of good moral character, have graduated from U.S.
Senator Charles Grassley, a Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, has requested the Comptroller General of the United States and the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to “fully investigate” certain aspects of the Optional Practical Training (OPT) program. The OPT program allows foreign national students who have completed their studies in the United…
AUTHOR : Melina V. Villalobos
The Fair Labor Standards Act minimum wage provisions may apply to J-1 Exchange visitors regardless of their immigration status, a federal District Court for the Middle District of Florida has held. Chaturong Jatupornchaisri v. Wyndham Vacation Ownership, Inc., 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 63633 (M.D. Fla. May 7, 2012). The FLSA…
In November of last year, the cut-off dates for China and India Employment-based Second Preference Category (EB2) were at November 1, 2007. This meant that Chinese and Indian national with priority dates of November 1, 2007, or earlier are eligible to file their I-485, Application for Adjustment of Status. Unexpectedly, over the course of a…
USCIS began to accept petitions for H-1B visas that are subject to the Fiscal Year 2013 Cap on April 2, 2012. The current annual Cap on available visas is 65,000. Some petitions are exempt from the Cap under the advanced degree exemption. The first 20,000 petitions received and filed for a beneficiary who has obtained a …
