The December 2020 Visa Bulletin was released earlier this afternoon/evening. No major changes to note other than the date for filing for EB3 India retrogressing a full year, likely as a result of the significant amount of downgrade filings from the EB2 India category. The EB1 China and EB1 India categories continue to see fairly[…]
USCIS announced today its plans to implement a revised version of the naturalization civics test, effective for all applicants applying for naturalization on or after December 1, 2020. Upon first glance, it appears the only substantive changes are that the number of potential questions is increasing from 100 to 128, the number of questions asked[…]
The yo-yo continues. Following Monday’s announcement that a District Court had vacated the public charge rule, this morning the 7th Circuit put an administrative stay on lower court’s ruling which vacated the public charge rule, meaning public charge is back ON again. Greencard applicants, at least for the time being, will have to submit their[…]
The on-again, off-again public charge saga continues, as a District Court has vacated the DHS/USCIS final rule on public charge. The ruling takes effect immediately and USCIS may not apply the public charge as of today, meaning that applicants for greencards no longer have to submit the dreaded Form I-944 and its mountainous supporting documents.[…]
The November 2020 Visa Bulletin was finally released this morning, a mere 3 days before the end of the month, the latest a visa bulletin has ever been released in history. Fortunately, it carried good news, as the filing dates and final action dates were largely unchanged from the previous month. Additionally, USCIS has already[…]
USCIS announced today that premium processing fees are set to increase, effective on Monday, October 19, 2020. True to form, the agency did not see fit to give any sort of advance notice or warning to those potentially affected. The move will increase premium processing for most categories (including H-1Bs, Ls, and eligible I-140s) from[…]
Today, the DHS and DOL announced the much anticipated and dreaded rules, which affect H-1B visas and Prevailing Wage requirements for H-1Bs/PERMs, respectively. Both rules will be published as Interim Final Rules, meaning the agencies can forego the usual notice and comment requirements, with the DHS rule set to take effect 60 days from tomorrow[…]
More chaos and cruelty from the Trump administration. DHS is now proposing a rule to, among other things, require Affidavit of Support sponsors to submit credit reports/scores, certified copies of income tax returns, and bank account information. Additionally, any sponsor who has received a public benefit in the 36 months preceding filing will have to[…]
Following the nationwide preliminary injunction which stopped the new USCIS fee schedule from taking effect on Friday, USCIS responded in kind, claiming they are severely underfunded and this move would hurt the agency. Copied from USCIS: Release Date 09/30/2020 WASHINGTON-U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Deputy Director of Policy Joseph Edlow issued the following[…]
Following up on our two previous blog posts from this morning, it appears that USCIS has now indicated that the Dates for Filing chart applies to those applicants wishing to file for their greencards under the employment-based preference categories. This is in contrast to previous information issued earlier this morning, but represents great news for many[…]