| Contents | Vol. 3, No. 1, January 2009 |
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New Format With the new year, we are moving to a different newsletter format. We now present the first paragraph of each story, with the remainder continued on our web site. We hope that you will like this new, more compact format. |
| Comprehensive immigration reform is on the front burner |
| The Congressional leadership has made it clear that comprehensive immigration reform (CIR) is a major legislative priority for the 111th Congress. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has said repeatedly that it will be introduced and passed this year. Sen. John McCain has said that he will introduce legislation similar to his previous proposals. He has been designated by the leadership as the quarterback for the new legislative effort. |
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| PERM processing comes to a virtual halt |
| Reports from law offices across America show that the Department of Labor’s Atlanta processing office has not acted on a single PERM case filed after June 1, 2008. For cases that went to audit, it appears that no cases have been processed since at least November, 2007. This is further substantiated by the additional anecdotal evidence found on Trackitt (http://www.trackitt.com/usa-immigration-trackers/atlanta-perm-report/). |
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| Good news for H1B filers this year |
| Employers wishing to file new H1B petitions this year are in for a pleasant surprise. Unlike the past two years, when more petitions that slots available under the entire annual quota have been filed, this year should see substantially fewer petitions filed. It is highly likely that the 20,000 “master’s cap” exemption will remain open beyond the initial filing window. This means that all petitions filed in that initial window will be accepted. It is also possible that the 65,000 “regular cap” will either not fill during the initial filing window, or if it does fill, the total number of filings will only slightly exceed the total number of slots available. |
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| February Visa Bulletin movement |
| The February Visa Bulletin shows modest forward movement for China and India employment based second preference and China EB3. Worldwide third preference did not advance at all. The next two months should reveal what the Visa Office intends with respect to cutoff date movement for the rest of this fiscal year. |
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| H1B consulting companies come under extreme scrutiny |
| This past year, we saw a radical change in the way that the USCIS and the State Department scrutinized nonimmigrant visa petitions and applications, specifically those sponsored by consulting companies. After the spring H-1b rush this past year, it became very clear that the USCIS was paying more attention to who was petitioning for those Hs. While the volume of requests for evidence (RFE) issued for these types of companies went up, we found it more alarming that all of the requests were identical templates. In fact, on many occasions, the requests were obviously irrelevant to the petitioner, but were included due to the boilerplate nature of the USCIS' new approach to weeding out fraud. |
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| Tax news |
| With the New Year arriving, we must start to think about filing tax returns in the US for the year 2008. You may ask what you need to gather together to have your tax returns properly prepared for filing the returns? Well, here is a short list. Some items may not apply and there may be other items that are not listed, but here are the basics: |
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| H1B assistance - what we can do for you. |
| When you shop for H1B legal services, you need to make sure that you are comparing similar services and the provider you select gives you everything you need. We bring a different approach to the practice of immigration law. Our philosophy is very simple: the most important aspect of any case is our client’s state of mind. Designing and implementing an immigration solution is a simple engineering problem. It is not at all difficult for experienced immigration professionals. The difficult part of representation, the art of practicing immigration law effectively, is dealing with our clients’ worries and concerns. |
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