Employment-Based Visa

Employment-Based Visa Categories in the United States

One of the key principles guiding the U.S. immigration system has been admitting foreign workers with skills that are valuable to the U.S. economy. Current U.S. immigration law provides several paths for foreign workers to enter the United States for employment purposes on a temporary or permanent basis.

Temporary Employment-Based Visa Classifications

There are many different temporary employment-based visa classifications.   Most of the classifications are defined in section 101(a)(15) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), and the visa classifications are referred to by the letter and numeral that denotes their subsection of that law. Temporary employment-based visa classifications permit employers to hire and petition for foreign nationals for specific jobs for limited periods. Most temporary workers must work for the employer that petitioned for them and have limited ability to change jobs.  In most cases, they must leave the United States if their status expires or if their employment is terminated.

Permanent Employment-Based Immigration

Lawful permanent residency allows a foreign national to work and live lawfully and permanently in the United States. Lawful permanent residents (LPRs) are eligible to apply for nearly all jobs (i.e., jobs not legitimately restricted to U.S. citizens) and can remain in the country even if they are unemployed. Immigrants who acquired lawful permanent resident status through employment may apply for U.S. citizenship after five years. 

Numerical limits and Per-Country Limits

In addition to the annual numerical limit on the number of employment-based immigrant visas, each country is limited to seven percent of the worldwide level of U.S. immigrant admissions, otherwise known as per-country limits.  Because of numerical and per-country limits, and because in some preference categories there are more petitions each year than visas available, some individuals must wait a significant period of time to apply for adjustment of status (in the U.S.) or an immigrant visa (abroad) even after the employer’s petition is approved by USCIS.

As of September 2016, most preference categories were current for most countries, meaning that visas are available as petitions are received. However, for some employment-based preference categories, there are backlogs for petitions for individuals born in certain countries with high annual levels, such as India, China, Mexico, and the Philippines. 

When to Apply for U.S. Citizenship?

When Can I Apply for U.S. Citizenship?

The "five years of permanent residence" rule and more guidance on the naturalization process.

If you are a U.S. permanent or conditional resident -- that is, someone with a green card -- the basic rule is that you cannot apply for U.S. citizenship (or apply to naturalize) until you have lived in the United States as a lawful permanent resident for at least five years. That means exactly five years, to the day.

For example:

if you were approved for permanent residence on April 17, 2011, you would be eligible for citizenship on April 17, 2016. Check your so-called green card (permanent resident card) for the exact date on which you became a permanent resident.

If you start out as a conditional rather than a permanent resident (most likely because you got your residence either through recent marriage to a U.S. citizen or through an investor visa), your two years as a conditional resident count as permanent residence, on one condition: You must successfully become a permanent resident at the end of the two years.

Any one of several exceptions may, however, reduce the amount of time you must wait.
or at least the ones that apply to civilians. If you are a member of, or relative of someone who has been with the U.S. Armed Forces.

90-Days Early Application Rule

Despite the five years of permanent residence requirement, you are actually allowed to submit your naturalization application to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) within the 90-days before your five-year anniversary has arrived. The reason has to do with timing.

Removal Hearing in Immigration

What Will Happen at Your Master Calendar Hearing?

Learn how to prepare yourself for your preliminary immigration hearing.

A master calendar hearing (“MCH”) is a short, preliminary hearing on immigration matters -- the usual start to efforts to remove an immigrant from the United States. You will meet with the Judge and the government attorney to figure out how your case will proceed. The Judge will schedule dates for your submission of written documents, and for your individual merits hearing (at which the substance of your applications or claims and/or defenses will be addressed in detail). If you have an attorney, he or she will answer most of the Judge’s questions.

During a MCH, the Court will not address any legal claims or defenses of your case. You will not be questioned about your case or immigration applications, and will not present any witnesses. The Judge will not make any rulings regarding legal issues in your case.

How to Prepare for Your MCH

You will first receive a Notice to Appear (“NTA”), which will specify the date and place of your MCH. Note that you must personally attend your MCH, even if your lawyer attends as well.
You may bring family members with you to the court. Make sure that they have legal immigration status. Otherwise, they may be arrested. It is not a good idea to bring children. Dress appropriately – in clean, neat, conservative clothes.

Arrive on time at your MCH. If you are absent -- or even late -- you might be ordered deported “in absentia” (due to your absence) or the Judge might deny your legal claims or defenses. Arriving early is a particularly wise idea because going through a security check point can take a while.

Try to find out ahead of time how your local Court operates. Bring important documents with you: your identification documents (passports, a driving license), your NTA (or another “hearing notice” that directed you to come to court), and any original documents that might be helpful at this preliminary stage (based on your lawyer’s suggestion). Also, bring a calendar, because the Judge will schedule deadlines in your case.

During your MCH, you will most likely be before the Judge for about five to 20 minutes only, although you might be in Court for several hours (including time to check in and wait). Plan accordingly.

Business Leaders

Business Leaders Rebuke the Government’s Family Separation and Imprisonment Policies


Criticism continues to mount for the Government administration’s zero-tolerance policy and practice of separating and imprisoning migrant families along the U.S.-Mexico border. While the administration clumsily shifts its narrative around the policy, business leaders took action against what Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi‏ called an “immoral” and “unfathomable” practice.

Khosrowshahi, who is himself a refugee from Iran, announced his plans to provide legal aid to asylum-seeking families who have been ripped apart at the southern border.

In a memo sent to Uber employees on Tuesday, the company said that its legal team is exploring “immediate opportunities” to provide to assistance to the parents and children affected by the family separation policy. Uber is also partnering with U.S. legislators and regulators to bring an end to the policy.

Other corporate giants have stepped forward to voice their opposition to the administration’s zero-tolerance policy.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai also spoke out against family separation this week, saying:
“The stories and images of families being separated at the border are gut-wrenching.” Pichai, an immigrant from India, added that he is “urging our government to work together to find a better, more humane way that is reflective of our values as a nation.”

In addition, American, United, Southwest, and Frontier airlines issued statements to the federal government, saying the companies will not use their aircraft to transport migrant children separated from their families. Additional airlines followed suit throughout the week.

Their statements came after a viral photo taken aboard an airplane showed a group of immigrant children reportedly being flown from Arizona to Florida.

In its statement, American Airlines said:
“We have no desire to be associated with separating families, or worse, to profit from it. We have every expectation the government will comply with our request and we thank them for doing so.”

Next Steps

 

 

This is the handout immigrant parents get before they're separated from their children during immigration process

 

  

A document given to immigrants who are arrested and separated from their children at the US-Mexico border, is at the heart of the Trump administration's new policy toward immigrant families.

Customs and Border Protection provided the document to CNN during a walk-through of a border processing center in McAllen, Texas, near the US-Mexico border.

The handout, titled "Next Steps for Families," explains in both English and Spanish the four steps ahead for detained immigrants with children. The form references a handful of bureaucratic acronyms and provides three main "actions" for helping the parents locate their child or children after they are separated.

Immigrant Heritage Month

Celebrating Immigrant Heritage Month and Being Welcoming Is Good for You and Your Community

June is Immigrant Heritage Month, and given the shrill and often negative rhetoric we hear around immigration, it seems more important than ever to take time to appreciate our immigration history and what newcomers bring to our nation and our lives.

Though our country’s roots can be largely traced back to successive generations of immigrants, many of today’s federal immigration policies ignore and do a disservice to that history.

However, there are bright spots, as state and local governments increasingly pursue immigration policies and initiatives that integrate immigrants and capitalize on the new energy they bring to local communities.

Additionally, a growing number of communities have adopted welcoming policies where local governments and community groups work to devise innovative programs and policies that help immigrants integrate into the fabric of the city, and, in return, become more productive community members.

Interestingly, some of the states welcoming and benefitting from immigration now were once struggling with the issue, even passing punitive immigration enforcement policies. However, many are rethinking their old exclusionary policies and are reaping the benefits as a result.

Many of these welcoming cities are also participating in Immigrant Heritage Month activities as another way to bring neighbors together. Through events across America, communities will celebrate the contributions that immigrants have made and continue to make to our nation.

This type of community building that local communities are taking on is powerful.

Children in Custody

What Happens When Migrant Children Are Taken Into U.S. Custody?

The glut of stories surfacing about family separation and the increasing number of migrant children being taken into U.S. custody is deeply concerning. In the past, children detained in shelters had arrived at the border without an adult. Now, however, the U.S. government is making children unaccompanied by intentionally separating them from their parents upon arrival.

Presumably the same policies, procedures, and security checks U.S. officials follow when taking custody of unaccompanied children will apply to the children they take away from parents, who are being criminally prosecuted and detained separately. However, these policies and procedures are about to be put to the test.

The Administration’s new family separation policy has already resulted in 658 children being separated from their parents in just a 13-day span in May. This increase in family separations means more children in the government’s custody for whom they must find a new home.

Currently when migrant children arrive at the U.S. border unaccompanied they are placed in the care and custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), a part of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Currently, ORR has a network of approximately 100 shelters in 14 states around the United States.