President Obama's Immigration Accountability Executive Action-What individuals and employers need to know

On November 20, 2014, President Obama outlined his long-awaited executive action to provide wide-reaching relief to millions of undocumented persons.  The Miller Law Offices provides you with our analysis of the benefits programs that could affect you, your company and your employees.

These programs include President Obama's  plan to provide temporary deferred action for the parents of U.S. citizens and permanent residents.  The President also removed the age restrictions for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.  The Executive Action also includes

• Greater utilization of the EB-2 National Interest Waiver for the "brightest and best" high skilled potential immigrants
• Modernization of the employment-based immigrant visa system
• National interest waiver and parole for foreign inventors, researchers and founders of start-up enterprises
• Expansion and extension of on-the-job training for STEM graduates of U.S universities
• Unlawful Presence Provisional Waiver expansion

 Click Here to download the Bulletin in Adobe PDF format...

WSJ: Executive Immigration Action May Include Legal Reforms

On September 18, 2014 the Wall Street Journal reported that after Labor Day President Obama may announce executive actions to give "safe harbor and work permits to qualifying illegal immigrants". Business leaders and interest groups who have been meeting with the White House throughout the Summer have requested overhaul measures for the legal workforce. One proposal would exclude dependents from the numerical cap on employment-based green cards, which is now 140,000 a year. The change could, in effect, double the number of green cards available. A second proposal would "recapture" unused employment green cards from previous years, which could produce more than 200,000 new green cards.

Employers sponsor foreign employees using the PERM application process

Foreign workers applying for permanent resident (green card) status under certain classifications, such as the employment based third preference classification (EB-3) and employment based second preference classification (EB-2), except for those filing under the National Interest Waiver provision, will require an approved labor certification.

We provide employers with an overview of the PERM process for that necessary labor certification with an excerpt from the CCH book Immigration Law in the Workplace ,  the leading national resource book for both immigration employment benefits and compliance information.

The distinguished attorney authors, Charles M. Miller, Marcine A. Seid, and S. Christopher Stowe, Jr. provide you with clear, concise explanations of the benefits that foreign employees may qualify for.

OPT 17 Month Extension Despite Thesis Requirement Before Graduation

The USCIS released a policy memorandum which clarifies the situation where the applicant requests a 17 month STEM OPT extension prior to graduation where there is a thesis requirement to  be fulfilled. The October 6, 2013 memorandum allows F-1 students who are engaging in post- completion OPT to be eligible for a 17-month STEM extension even if they have not yet completed the thesis requirement or equivalent for their STEM degree.

Mayor Bloomberg joins Silicon Valley push for high-skill immigration - The Hill's Hillicon Valley

Mayor Bloomberg joins Silicon Valley push for high-skill immigration - The Hill's Hillicon Valley

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and a coalition of investors and technology company executives announced a new campaign on Monday for immigration legislation. The campaign, called the "March for Innovation," will culminate later this spring in a "virtual march on Washington" using online tools like Facebook and Twitter to persuade lawmakers.

Hatch, Klobuchar, Rubio, Coons Introduce High-Skilled Immigration Bill

Bipartisan Legislation Reforms Employment-Based H-1B and Student Visas, Increases Access to Employment-Based Green Cards, and Promotes STEM Education

U.S. Senators Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Chris Coons (D-Del.) today introduced legislation, the Immigration Innovation (I2) Act of 2013, to bring long-overdue reforms to the nation’s immigration laws for high-skilled workers. The bill focuses on areas vital to ensuring the United States can maintain its competitiveness in the global economy: the quantity of employment-based nonimmigrant visas (H-1B visas), allowing for their growth depending on the demands of the economy while making reforms to protect workers; increased access to green cards for high-skilled workers by expanding the exemptions and eliminating the annual per country limits for employment based green cards; and reforming the fees on H-1B and green cards so those fees can be used to promote American worker retraining and education.

Read More

STEM Green Cards Part of Comprehensive Immigration Reform Proposal

The “gang of 8”, Senators Schumer, McCain, Durbin, Graham, Menendez, Rubio, Bennet, and Flake has released its Bipartisan Framework for Comprehensive Immigration Reform on January28, 2013.

In the section of the proposal entitled “Improving our Legal Immigration System and Attracting the World’s Best and Brightest” the proposal philosophically embraces efficient green cards for STEM graduates in the following language:  

"The United States must do a better job of attracting and keeping the world’s best and brightest. As such, our immigration proposal will award a green card to immigrants who have received a PhD or Master’s degree in science, technology, engineering, or math from an American university. It makes no sense to educate the world’s future innovators and entrepreneurs only to ultimately force them to leave our country at the moment they are most able to contribute to our economy.”