On June 26, 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Trump administration’s Travel Ban (version 3.0) by a 5-4 vote. Formally referred to as the September 24, 2017, Presidential Proclamation, the Travel Ban restricts travel to the United States for nationals of the following seven countries: Iran, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Venezuela, and North Korea. For Venezuela, the travel ban is limited to certain government officials and their family members visiting the U.S. on business or tourist visas (B-1/B-2).
With the Trump administration preparing to repeal the H-4 EAD this summer, several independent studies of the economic impact of H-4 spouses with employment authorization are underway. We highly recommend that individuals in H-4 status complete this survey.
The Department of State (DOS) has issued its July 2018 Visa Bulletin. Most notably, the Employment-Based (“EB”)-3 category for Chinese nationals retrogressed dramatically by two years and five months to January 1, 2013. EB-2 for Chinese and Indian nationals, and EB-3 for Indian nationals made significant advances while EB-1 for Chinese and Indian nationals and EB-3 for Philippine nationals had no movement.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is moving to officially end the International Entrepreneur Parole Program under which certain foreign national entrepreneurs could have come to the United States to develop and oversee start-up businesses. The Program was created by the Obama Administration and was supposed to take effect in July 2017. However, implementation of the Program has been delayed and, although USCIS started accepting applications in March 2018 (after a Court order), it’s unlikely that any applications actually have been approved.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) issued a policy memorandum this week, changing the way unlawful presence will be calculated for students (F-1), exchange visitors (J-1), and vocational students (M-1), and their dependents, while in the United States. The new policy memorandum will take effect on August 9, 2018.
The Department of State (DOS) has issued its June 2018 Visa Bulletin. For the most part, priority dates for employment-based categories remain the same from last month’s visa bulletin. The only category to advance is EB-3 India, which moved forward by four days.
USCIS recently announced that it would start phasing in use of the U.S. Postal Service’s (“USPS”) Signature Confirmation Restricted Delivery service to mail Green Cards, Employment Authorization Documents (“EAD”) and Refugee Travel Documents, on April 30, 2018. During this phase, USCIS will re-mail the aforementioned documents that have been returned as non-deliverable.
The Department of State (DOS) has issued its May 2018 Visa Bulletin. For the most part, priority dates for employment-based categories remain the same from last month’s visa bulletin. The Employment-Based (“EB”)-1 category for Chinese nationals advanced by one month from April’s dates while the EB-3 category for Indian nationals moved forward by 3 months.
On April 6, 2018, USCIS announced it had reached the 65,000 H-1B visa cap and the 20,000 visa U.S. advanced degree exemption cap (the “Master’s cap”) for fiscal year 2019.
USCIS has not specified yet how many H-1B cap-subject petitions it received this year.
Earlier this week, USCIS provided guidance on how to pay for government filing fees with credit cards. Last month (February 2017), USCIS began accepting credit card payments for 41 fee-based forms processed at USCIS Lockbox facilities. Applicants must use Form G-1450, Authorization for Credit Card Transaction and may pay with Visa, MasterCard, American Express or Discover.
