Michael H. Neifach

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The Department of Labor (DOL) announced its H-2A Transition Plan for updating its Foreign Labor Application Gateway (FLAG) system based on the preliminary injunction (known as the Kansas Order) issued by the U.S. District Court for the District of Southern Georgia. That order prevents the DOL from enforcing its new H-2A Farmworker Visa Rule against…

The Department of Labor (DOL) has decided to delay updating its Foreign Labor Application Gateway, or FLAG, case processing system to implement revised H-2A job order and application forms for the new 2024 Farmworkers Protection Final Rule until further notice. For now, H-2A job orders and applications will continue to be received and processed under…

Seventeen states joined in a suit in June to block the Department of Labor (DOL) from enforcing its new rule providing more protections to farmworkers employed as H-2A temporary visa holders. Now, Judge Lisa Godbey Wood of the U.S. District Court for the District of Southern Georgia has granted a preliminary injunction preventing the DOL…

USCIS announced that it is extending the validity of certain Employment Authorization Documents (EADs) issued to Temporary Protected Status (TPS) beneficiaries from El Salvador, Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua, and Sudan until March 9, 2025. Currently, most of these individuals are the beneficiaries of automatic extensions through June 30, 2024.

To implement these new extensions, USCIS is…

President Joe Biden announced protections for undocumented foreign national spouses of U.S. citizens who have lived in the United States for 10 years without a legal immigration status. This will protect approximately 500,000 such spouses from deportation and fear of deportation. The program is expected to launch by summer’s end.

This comes on the 12…

President Joe Biden has ordered a temporary suspension of asylum applications for migrants who cross the southern border illegally between ports of entry.

This suspension went into effect at midnight on June 5 because the number of illegal border crossings (or encounters) has reached the order’s threshold of 2,500 per day. If illegal encounters drop…

Many USCIS filing fees are being adjusted upward beginning on April 1, 2024. That date, of course, is particularly significant. It is the earliest date that Cap H-1Bs can be filed.

The H-1B filing fee, for example, will rise from $460 to $780. The ACWIA Fee (to fund the training of U.S. workers) and the…

In response to the Executive Order (EO) on Artificial Intelligence, on December 21, 2023, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued a request for information in the Federal Register asking for public comment on possible additions to the Schedule A list, including more STEM or non-STEM fields.

On October 30, 2023, as part of the EO…