USCIS Resumes Premium Processing for All H-1B Petitions – Could Earn Approx. $330,000,000 in PP Fees This Year
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that it will resume premium processing for all H-1B petitions beginning today, Tuesday, March 12, 2019. This is welcome news for many petitioners and beneficiaries who have been subjected to significant delays in processing, and certainly, great news for USCIS itself. There is no doubt that Premium Processing fees, increased to $1,410.00 per petition last year, are an important source of revenue for USCIS, given that is “funded primarily by immigration and naturalization benefit fees charged to applicants and petitioners.”
Premium Processing fees are technically optional, but frequently paid to increase the speed of adjudication from several months to potentially as little as two (2) to four (4) weeks. This program was suspended and unavailable for many H-1B categories over the last 6-12 months during which time such professionals and their employers nervously witnessed (or were impacted by) adjudication delays of approximately 4-12+ months, as well as USCIS’s frequent internal changes to its adjudication criteria which allowed it to issue bizzare numbers of queries and denials of H-1B petitions in 2018.
American Immigration Lawyers Association asks Secretary of State John Kerry and other Officials to restore the dates in the September 9, 2015 Visa Bulletin
Earlier today, the American Immigration Lawyers Association indicated that it had sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, and Director of the Domestic Policy Council Cecilia Muñoz expressing great disappointment in the September 25, 2015, changes to the October 2015 Visa Bulletin, and asking that the dates published in the September 9, 2015, Visa Bulletin be restored. The revised October 2015 Visa Bulletin rolls back the “Dates for Filing” for several visa categories, and will force many individuals and families to continue to face lengthy wait times before they can submit their applications for permanent residence.
Senate’s Immigration Bill Moves Forward Largely Unchanged
The Senate’s side of the Capitol Building in DC. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Senate has moved S. 744, the bipartisan immigration reform bill forward with a vote of 67-27 marking a substantial milestone for this country. The bill contains provisions that would uplift millions of workers and their families by providing a path to legalization for the undocumented and much needed changes to the family and business immigration processes, while maintaining a focus on border security and immigration enforcement.
Related articles
- Immigration Reform Passes Key Senate Test (fox17online.com)
- Senate votes to proceed with “border surge” amendment, immigration bill on track (nbclatino.com)
Press Release: AILA Commends Senate Judiciary Committee and Calls On Full Senate to Show Similar Commitment to Immigration Reform
Dirksen Senate Building room 226 from http://judiciary.senate.gov/information.cfm commons:category:United States Senate (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
AILA PRESS RELEASE
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
CONTACTS:
George Tzamaras or Belle Woods
202-507-7649 / 202-507-7675
gtzamaras@aila.org / bwoods@aila.org
WASHINGTON, DC – The Senate Judiciary Committee wrapped up weeks of work on immigration reform by passing S. 744 the “Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act” out of committee by a bipartisan vote of 13 to 5 last night. At the end of the hearing, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Leahy said, “The dysfunction in our current immigration system affects all of us and it is long past time for reform. I hope that our history, our values, and our decency can inspire us finally to take action,” as he successfully concluded an unprecedented effort to open the immigration reform process to the public by making all amendments available online.
Public Service Announcement: Beware the promises of Notarios – Immigration Reform Hasn’t Happened Yet.
AILA has released the Public Service Announcement (.pdf link above) entitled “Beware the promises of Notarios! Immigration Reform Hasn’t Happened Yet.”
ETA 9089 PERM System Down for Several Days – AILA Investigating
The seal of the United States Department of Labor (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Department of Labor has been experiencing technical problems with the PERM system, which still remains unavailable.
The U.S. Immigration Law Blog by Ashwin Sharma 
AILA’s Immigration Quicktake: House Judiciary Subcommittee Hearing on High-Skilled Immigration
American Immigration Lawyers Association: Immigration Quicktake: House Judiciary Subcommittee Hearing on High-Skilled Immigration