Press Releases

Breaking News: District Court Block Enforcement of DHS and DOL Rules On Tuesday, December 1, 2020, a federal district court in California has blocked the enforcement of two new immigration regulations from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Labor (DOL), holding that these regulations violated the Administrative Procedures Act (APA) as it failed to go through the normal rulemaking process ...

DHS Public Charge Rule Vacated Nationwide This morning, on November 2, 2020, the district court in Cook County, Illinois, et al v. Wolf et. al., (19-cv-6334),  granted summary judgment in favor of  Plaintiffs on their claim that the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Public Charge Rule, 84 Fed. Reg. 41,292 (Aug. 14, 2019) violates the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”), 5 U.S.C. § 701 et. seq ...

Breaking News Premium Processing Fees Will Increase Effective October 19, 2020 U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that, effective Monday, October 19th, premium processing fees will increase from $1,440 to $2,500 for all petition types for which premium processing is currently available (except H-2B and R-1 petitions which will increase to $1,500) ...

COVID 19 Delay in Data Entry and Receipt Generation for FY 2021 H-1B Cap-Subject Petitions On April 13, 2020, USCIS announced that it would not immediately enter data and generate receipt notice for FY 2021 H-1B cap petition due to the impact of COVID-19 until at least May 1, 2020. As a result, the petitioner should expect a significant delay in receiving the H-1B receipt notice for the FY 2021 H-1B cap petitions ...

USCIS has announced that the annual limit for Fiscal Year (FY) 2021 H-1B cap employment has been met and the lottery selection process has been completed. USCIS intends to notify employers of the selection results by March 31, but some registrants are already able to view the status of their submissions in their registration accounts ...

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security published notice regarding the US-Canada Joint Initiative in the Federal Register restricting non-essential travel due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It is effective tonight at midnight, March 21st, until 11:59 pm on April 20th. Under this initiative, all non-essential travel across its borders is restricted ...

Non-essential Travel Between the US and Canada to be Suspended This morning President Trump said that the U.S. and Canada will suspend non-essential travel between the two countries due to the coronavirus pandemic. Trump communicated that temporarily closing the Norther Border with Canada to non-essential traffic was upon mutual consent, and that trade would not be affected. We are awaiting details of how this will be implemented and what constitutes non-essential traffic ...

DHS Suspends Trusted Traveler Programs for All New York State Residents Acting Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Chad Wolf announced that as of February 5, 2020 DHS would immediately suspend Trusted Traveler Programs (TTP) for all New York residents, including Global Entry, NEXUS, Sentri and FAST. The suspension applies to new enrollments as well as re-enrollments. CBP will cancel all pending TTP applications submitted by New York residents ...

H-1B Electronic Registration to Open March 1, 2020 On January 9, 2020, USCIS published a Federal Register notice formally announcing the implementation of the electronic registration for the fiscal year (FY) 2021 H-1B cap-subject petitions. The registration period will run from March 1 through Mach 20, 2020. During this timeframe, employers, or their authorized representatives, must complete an electronic registration and pay the associated $10 fee for each submission ...

USCIS Announces Implementation of H-1B Electronic Registration Process for Fiscal Year 2021 Cap Season USCIS announced that it is implementing the registration process in the FY2021 H-1B lottery. Employers seeking to file FY2021 H-1B cap-subject petitions, including those eligible for the advanced degree exemption, must first electronically register and pay the associated $10 H-1B registration fee ...

USCIS Issues Guidance on Adjustment of Status by Aliens Whose Conditional Permanent Residence Has Been Terminated USCIS issued policy guidance explaining how USCIS applies Matter of Stockwell and clarifying when USCIS may adjust the status of an alien whose Conditional Permanent Resident (CPR) status has been terminated. An immigration judge does not need to affirm the termination of CPR status before the alien can file a new adjustment of status application ...

USCIS Implements $10 Registration Fee for H-1B Cap-Subject Petitions The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has proposed a rule that will require petitioners seeking to file H-1B cap-subject petitions to pay a $10 fee for each registration they submit to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) for the H-1B cap selection process ...

USCIS Returns Unselected FY2020 H-1B Cap-Subject Petitions USCIS has confirmed that it has returned all fiscal year (FY) 2020 H-1B cap-subject petitions that were not selected in the computer-generated random selection process. If you submitted an FY 2020 H-1B cap-subject petition that was delivered to USCIS between April 1 and April 5, 2019, and you have not received a receipt notice or confirmation that the petition was returned by August 29, please contact your legal counsel ...

 USCIS Publishes Final Rule On Public Charge The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) published a final rule on August 14, 2019 that will greatly expand the categories of public benefits looked at to determine whether a foreign national may be deemed a public charge and thus inadmissible to enter and remain in the United States, either temporarily or permanently. The rule is slated to go into effect on October 15th, 2019 ...

Update: August 2019 Visa Bulletin The Department of State released the August 2019 Visa Bulletin. The EB-1 Final Action dates (with the exception of India that remained on 01Jan2015) had across the board retrogression to July 1, 2016, resulting in a retrogression of several months to over one year, including EB-1 Worldwide. EB-2, EB-3, and Other Workers for Worldwide, Mexico, Philippines and Vietnam all retrogressed, as did India (EB-3 and Other Workers) ...

In a move that is part of the Trump Administration’s pledge to implement heightened screening and vetting of applications for visas, a new question in relation to social media and contact history now appears on the DS-160 and DS-260 forms which are used by visa applicants at U.S. consulates ...

Federal Preliminary Injunction Blocks USCIS Unlawful Presence Policy for F, J, and M Nonimmigrants A federal district judge has issued a nationwide preliminary injunction immediately enjoining UCSIS’ Unlawful Presence Policy for F, J, and M Nonimmigrants. Pursuant to its 2018 policy memo (titled “Accrual of Unlawful Presence and F, J, and M Nonimmigrants”), USCIS changed the way it calculates unlawful presence for F, J, and M Nonimmigrants ...