Insight, News, and Strategy on Immigration Matters Around the World
Online FY 2021 Diversity Lottery registration began on Wednesday, October 2, 2019 at noon (EDT) and ends on Tuesday, November 5, 2019 at noon (EDT). This year, 55,000 Diversity Visas (DVs) will be available. The Diversity Lottery provides visas to people from countries with historically low rates of immigration to the U.S.
There is no…
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) cancelled an incoming Harvard freshman’s visa and deported him back to Lebanon eight hours after arriving at Boston’s Logan International Airport to start his college career. CBP detained the incoming student along with several other international students who were ultimately admitted to the U.S. According to reports, CBP deemed Ismail…
Having focused on enforcement and illegal immigration, the Trump Administration has recently turned to legal immigration. The new Public Charge rule which will go into effect on October 15, 2019, absent court action, will make it harder for some foreign nationals to obtain green cards or even to secure or extend temporary non-immigrant status. What…
The Department of State (DOS) has announced a significant retrogression from the July 2019 Visa Bulletin to the August 2019 Visa Bulletin of at least 3 years in many of the employment-based categories.
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The Trump Administration has been stepping up the collection of data in general and more specifically from visa applicants and travelers.
Here are a few new policies:
The U.S. Ambassador to New Zealand, Scott P. Brown, has announced that eligible New Zealand nationals may apply for E-1/E-2 Treaty Investor Visas:
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Two years ago, then-Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, proposed collecting 15 years of travel, address and employment history and 5 years of social media platforms, identifiers, phone numbers and emails from visa applicants selected for “extreme vetting.” It was predicted that this would affect only 0.5% of all visa applicants – approximately 65,000 annually. As of June 1, 2019, with the introduction of a new DS-160 Form, some of this information will be collected from all visa applicants – affecting approximately 15 million foreign nationals planning to come to the U.S.
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The days of spontaneously traveling to Europe on a whim are coming to an end for U.S. citizens. For many years, U.S. citizens have been able to travel to most European countries with only a valid U.S. passport as a travel document. In 2021, the European Schengen Zone will be requiring a registration similar to…
The U.S. Embassy in Israel has announced that the necessary agreement has been signed and Israeli citizens will be able to apply for an E-2 Visa as of May 1, 2019. This is an important announcement for the Israeli high-tech sector and the U.S. economy because it opens new possibilities for Israelis wishing to create…
In 2016, a married gay couple in Canada became parents of twins using a surrogate mother. One father is a U.S. citizen, the other an Israeli citizen. The two fathers made a decision to contribute one embryo each to the surrogate mother so the twins would be biologically related to each of them. However, that…
