USCIS to Conduct Second Round of Cap H-1B Selections After its initial March round of random selections of electronic cap candidate registrations USCIS determined that a second round of selections is required to meet the numerical allocation of available H-1B visa slots for fiscal year 2025. USCIS will conduct the second round draw before the […]
The Department of Homeland Security has announced the extension and redesignation of Haiti for TPS. This means that individuals who already have TPS are able extend their stay and work authorization and that individuals who have not previously held TPS are able to apply for initial approval. Please note that the extension of TPS for […]
The Biden Administration announced that the Department of Homeland Security will take action to grant permanent residency to some spouses of US citizens who are not lawfully present in the United States. The program will begin accepting applications on August 19th after publication of a Federal Register Notice. To qualify for permanent residence, the noncitizen […]
Individuals who hold DACA work authorization are lawfully entitled to stay in the US and work for US employers. They also may be eligible for traditional work visas like H-1B and O-1. However, many DACA recipients have not lawfully maintained presence in the US and would be subject to a three year or ten year […]
USCIS has an Ombudsman that makes annual recommendations to the agency on how to improve. Oftentimes the report can indicate steps the agency may take in the future, whether they are already under consideration, or in response to the report. The USCIS Ombudsman released its 2024 Annual Report in June.
USCIS to Conduct Second Round of Cap H-1B Selections After its initial March round of random selections of electronic cap candidate registrations USCIS determined that a second round of selections is required to meet the numerical allocation of available H-1B visa slots for fiscal year 2025. USCIS will conduct the second round draw before the […]
USCIS has released a trial of its E-Verify+ platform to a select group of US employers. The E-Verify+ platform builds on the existing E-Verify tool to combine the I-9 and E-Verify processes into one tool and step. Every employer is required to complete Form I-9 when hiring any employee in the United States, regardless of […]
Meltzer Hellrung recently recorded an L-1 visa approval for a client where the sponsored employee had never been an employee of a related foreign company. Rather the sponsored employee had worked as a dedicated contractor through a consulting company. L-1 visas are available for intra-company transfers where a company has related entities in the […]
On April 1st USCIS transitioned to a new submission process for H-1B petitions, moving the submission of petitions from the service centers to centralized lockboxes. Unfortunately, the rollout of this transition has been far from seamless. We have seen USCIS return numerous petitions erroneously in the first two months of the new procedures. For example, […]