“IMMIGRATION LAW CONNECTION”

Under the new, recently enacted Public Law 111-230,  certain U.S. employers of H-1B and L-1A workers, will have to submit an additional fee, for petitions postmarked on or after August 14, 2010.
Petitioners /Employers subject to this new fee include employers with 50 or more employees in the U.S., for which more than 50% [...]

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The U.S. General Services Administration has awarded a lease for a new building to house the Tampa District/Field Office. The new office will be constructed on Hoover Boulevard just north of West Hillsborough Avenue in Tampa, Florida. The building will contain 36,767 usable square feet of space to accommodate approximately 111 employees. The Field Office [...]

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USCIS has just announced that starting October 1, 2010, domestic offices and U.S. territories, including the U.S. Virgin Islands and Guam, will no longer accept cash payment.
USCIS states that eliminating the acceptance of cash will reduce USCIS operating costs.  As an alternative to cash, customers may pay using checks (including personal checks), money orders, and [...]

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Following suit on the U.S. State Department’s move to increase filing fees in an effort to offset rising processing costs,  USCIS is now proposing some sweeping fee increases of about 10% in the coming weeks or months.
According to a recent USCIS press release, “USCIS is a fee-based organization with about 90 percent of its budget [...]

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In a continued effort to combat immigration fraud,  USCIS has just released some changes to its current Employment Authorization card/document (”EAD”).   The changes concern a new machine-readable strip on the back of the card, much like the recently revised “Green Card”.  The two-dimensional barcode has been removed, and the overall layout/formatting was altered.

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H-1B Employers/Petitioners who have received TARP-funds (”economic stimulus” funds) are subject to certain disclosures and restrictions with regard to hiring certain H-1B workers.
Under EAWA, any company that has received covered funding and seeks to hire new H-1B workers is considered an “H-1B dependent employer.” An H-1B dependent employer must make additional statements to the U.S. [...]

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International students currently in the United States on F-1 (who may or may not have OPT), who are the Beneficiary of a pending or approved, cap-subject H-1B worker petition (which will become effective on or after October 1, 2010), can bridge the time in between their old status expiring and the start date of their [...]

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In a development not seen in recent years, it took USCIS nearly 9 months to reach the sufficient number of cap-subject H-1B petitions to fill the annual quote for Fiscal Year 2010.
In recent years, it only took USCIS anywhere from 1 week to only 1 day, to receive sufficient H-1B petitions, when the annual filing [...]

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Yesterday, President Obama signed into law the Fiscal Year 2010 DHS Appropriations bill (P.L.111-83).
The law extends the non-minister religious worker (section 568), the “Conrad 30″ for J-1 visas (section 568), the EB-5 pilot program for regional center investments (section 548), and the E-Verify (section 547) programs through September 30, 2012.
The bill was previously [...]

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USCIS reminded the public that beginning Oct. 1, all citizenship applicants must take the new naturalization test, regardless of when they filed their Application for Naturalization (Form N-400).
To learn more about U.S. citizenship and the naturalization test, go to www.uscis.gov/citizenship.

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