Immigration Law

Masliah & Soloway Loses a Member of Our Family

Posted on January 20, 2010
Henri Masliah, the father of Noemi Masliah, passed away suddenly yesterday in Manhattan. Born in France, he survived the Second World War with his wife, Bella, though other members of their family were killed.  Henri and Bella moved to Cuba where they lived until the revolution...

H-1B Visas Run Out, CIS Will No Longer Accept Petitions for FY 2010. Petitions Received on December 21 Subject to "Random Selection"

Posted on December 23, 2009
In an announcement that may have been delayed by the massive east coast snowstorm that forced closure of the Washington, DC offices of the Immigration Service on Monday, USCIS posted the following update on the Fiscal Year 2010 H-1B count on its website yesterday:As of December 21, 2009, USCIS has received sufficient petitions to reach the statutory cap for FY2010...

Congressman Luis Gutierrez Hopes to Set the 2010 Agenda With Year-End Introduction of a Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill

Posted on December 23, 2009
As the year comes to a close we want to shift our focus to what is likely to be a significant, though only partial, blueprint of the battles to come in 2010 over immigration reform. The Comprehensive Immigration Reform for America?s Security and Prosperity Act of 2009 (CIR ASAP) was introduced on December 15 in the House by Rep...

CIS Instructs Doctors: Write "NO LONGER REQUIRED" for HIV Status Until New Medical Examination Forms Are Available

Posted on December 23, 2009
For those who have worked hard for 20 years advocating for the repeal of the HIV ban, including the partners of this firm, seeing the words "NO LONGER REQUIRED" written in a doctor's handwriting across that part of the I-693 will be the first tangible, graphic representation of this tremendous victory...

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Only 800 H-1Bs Left As of Tuesday December 15

Posted on December 17, 2009
Today USCIS posted the following update:As of December 15, 2009, approximately 64,200 H-1B cap-subject petitions had been filed. USCIS has approved sufficient H-1B petitions for aliens with advanced degrees to meet the exemption of 20,000 from the fiscal year 2010 cap...

62,900 H-1B Petitions Received as of December 11, USCIS Appears to be Receiving 500 Per Day

Posted on December 15, 2009
In quick succession, the USCIS has updated its count of the number of H-1B petitions received in the past week three times. The statistics indicate that we are in the last days of availability for this Fiscal Year, and that the number of petitions filed has accelerated rapidly to nearly 500 a day...

January 2010 Visa Bulletin: EB Third Preference Jumps Two Months to August 1, 2002

Posted on December 11, 2009
The good news in the latest Visa Bulletin is that there is finally significant movement in the Third Preference Employment-Based category for the first time this fiscal year. For all countries other than India and Mexico, EB-3 has jumped from June 1, 2002 cut-off to August 1, 2002 in just one month...

DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano Affirms Support for Immigration Reform in 2010

Posted on December 10, 2009
Yesterday the DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee reiterating her commitment to work with Congress to push for comprehensive immigration reform in early 2010.  Video of Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing here...

H-1B Petitions Received at a Rate of 100 Per Day: Yesterday's Count Update Shows Only 3,500 Left

Posted on December 09, 2009
Only four days since CIS brought us the last update on the Fiscal Year 2010 H-1B Cap Count, today we learned that since Friday another 400 H-1B petitions have been received.As of December 8, 2009, approximately 61,500 H-1B cap-subject petitions had been filed...

H-1Bs to Run Out Within Days

Posted on December 08, 2009
As we explained below, the annual allotment of 65,000 H-1Bs includes a set aside of 6,800 for Singapore and Chile. However, demand from those countries was not sufficient to use all 6,800 and what remains of them have become part of the 3,900 that remained available as of last Friday...

Immigration in the News

Posted on December 07, 2009
Today we launch a new feature of our law firm blog, a news round up in which we will link to a few news or opinion pieces chosen to represent diverse subject matters and sources.This morning, in their nationally syndicated column, well-known journalists Cokie Roberts and Steven V...

Alexander Aleinikoff Named United Nations Deputy High Commissioner on Refugees

Posted on December 04, 2009
T. Alexander Aleinikoff, dean of Georgetown University Law School and former senior official in the Immigration and Naturalization Service will be the new United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees starting in February 2010. Read more here.

H-1B Cap Almost Reached

Posted on December 01, 2009
USCIS is expected to announce soon that it has received a sufficient number of H-1B petitions to exhaust the 65,000 cap-subject H-1Bs allotted for the 2010 Fiscal Year. If that happens?and there is some speculation that the announcement may be only days away?the next filing period will begin April 1, 2010 for 2011 Fiscal Year H-1B visas...

USCIS Will Reopen Cases Recently Denied Solely Because of HIV Status, New Guidelines are Issued for Post-Repeal Adjudications

Posted on December 01, 2009
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) issued a memorandum last week establishing new procedures for adjudicating applications in advance of the effective date of the final regulations repealing the HIV ban.  That ban, which rendered inadmissible all HIV+ non-immigrants and would-be immigrants unless they qualified for a narrow waiver, had been in effect since the 1980s and had been widely condemned by human rights and public health advocates...

Green Card Lottery Submission Period Ends Today at Noon EST

Posted on November 30, 2009
The filing period for the Fiscal Year 2011 Diversity Visa Lottery or "Green Card" Lottery ends at 12 PM (noon) EST today, November 30, 2009. See our prior post here for details.

Fewer Than Nine Thousand H-1B Visas Left

Posted on November 25, 2009
As of November 20 approximately 56,900 H-1B cap-subject petitions had been filed for employment commencing during the 2010 Fiscal Year (October 1, 2009 to September 30, 2010). USCIS has approved sufficient H-1B petitions for aliens with advanced degrees to meet the exemption of 20,000 from the fiscal year 2010 cap...

Deadline November 30: One Week Left to Submit Applications to the "Green Card" Lottery

Posted on November 23, 2009
The filing period for the Fiscal Year 2011 Diversity Visa Lottery or "Green Card" Lottery ends on November 30, 2009. See our prior post here for details. (Photo: Permanent Resident Card, or "Green Card," which is actually an off-white color.)

Unexpectedly, the House Passes Health Care Reform Without Imposing a Waiting Period for Recent Immigrants

Posted on November 18, 2009
On November 7, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 3962, the Affordable Health Care for America Act, a bill that in part creates health insurance subsidies for people with low incomes. Congress was strongly lobbied to delay access to these subsidies for Lawful Permanent Residents (LPRs), or ?green card? holders, by imposing a five-year waiting period...

Last Two Weeks for Diversity Visa "Green Card" Lottery Filing Period

Posted on November 16, 2009
The filing period for the Fiscal Year 2011 Diversity Visa Lottery or "Green Card" Lottery ends on November 30, 2009. See our prior post here for details. (Photo: Permanent Resident Card, or "Green Card," which is actually an off-white color.)

Citizenship and Immigration Services May Increase Fees Again to Cover Budget Shortfall

Posted on November 14, 2009
In an interview today with the Houston Chronicle, Alejandro Mayorkas, the Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS) indicated that another round of application and petition filing fee increases was probable in the near term. While the fee increase story was first reported on September 23 by the LA Times, the Houston Chronicle interview made news on the same day as DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano's first major speech on the administration's goals for immigration reform...

Supreme Court Signals Interest in Federal/State Conflict over Immigration Law Enforcement

Posted on November 13, 2009
The Supreme Court indicated this week that it may address the question of whether individual States, as opposed to the federal government, can enforce federal immigration law.Specifically, the Supreme Court asked the U.S. Department of Justice for its view on whether a 2007 Arizona law that allows the State of Arizona to enforce federal immigration laws is constitutional...

White House to Push for Comprehensive Immigration Reform in Early 2010

Posted on November 13, 2009
The New York Times, reporting on DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano's speech today to the Center for American Progress, noted that today the Secretary confirmed the administration's intention to seek a path to legalization for an estimated 12 million undocumented persons now in the United States...

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano Gives First Speech on Immigration, Focusing on Enforcement and Reform

Posted on November 13, 2009
Secretary Janet Napolitano's Prepared Remarks delivered at the Center for American Progress on November 13, 2009 are available at the Department of Homeland Security website here. See video provided by the Center for American Progress here.

Masliah joins the American Immigration Council's Board of Trustees

Posted on November 11, 2009
Masliah & Soloway is proud to announce that Noemi has been appointed to the American Immigration Council?s Board of Trustees. Formerly the American Immigration Law Foundation, the American Immigration Council (?AIC?) was established in 1987 as the tax-exempt, non-profit educational and charitable sister organization to the American Immigration Lawyers? Association...

USCIS announces temporary period for filing H-1B petitions without certified LCAs

Posted on November 11, 2009
On November 5, 2009, the USCIS announced that, until March 4, 2010, it would begin accepting H-1B petitions filed without Labor Condition Applications (?LCAs?) that have been certified by the Department of Labor (?DOL?).Certified LCAs have been required prior to filing the H-1B petitions...

H-1B Count Update

Posted on November 07, 2009
According to the USCIS, as of October 25, 2009, approximately 20,000 advanced degree and approximately 52,800 cap-subject H-1B petitions have been received by the USCIS for the 2010 fiscal year. The agency will continue to accept both advanced degree and cap-subject cases, however all petitions received from now on will be counted towards the FY 2010 cap of 65,000.

Report Claims That Immigration Enforcement Is Undermining Workers' Rights

Posted on November 03, 2009
"Iced Out: How Immigration Enforcement Has Interfered with Workers? Rights," a report jointly issued on October 27 by the AFL-CIO, American Rights at Work and the National Employment Law Project and co-authored by Ana Avendaño, Rebecca Smith and Julie Martinez Ortega, concludes that an overseeing government entity is needed to moderate the enforcement of the nation?s immigration laws at the workplace and to ensure that workplace rights are not impeded by overzealous enforcement...

Follow Us on Twitter

Posted on November 02, 2009
You can now follow Masliah & Soloway Immigration Updates on Twitter. To stay informed about changes in immigration law and policy and to receive news about our law firm click here or look for our tweets under the name MasliahSoloway.

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius - Final Rule Repealing HIV Ban Will Be Effective January 2010: "I Am Pleased This Is Happening Now."

Posted on November 02, 2009
This morning, United States Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced the publication in today's Federal Register (74 FR 56547) of the final rule repealing HIV from the list of "communicable diseases of public health significance...

Advance Copy of the November 2, 2009 Final Rule Repealing the HIV Ban

Posted on October 31, 2009
Read it here. It becomes effective 60 days from publication, on January 1, 2010."As a result of this final rule, aliens will no longer be inadmissible into the United States based solely on the ground they are infected with HIV, and they will not be required to undergo HIV testing as part of the required medical examination for U...

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