Representative Zoe Lofgren sent letters to both Secretary Michael Chertoff and Secretary Condi Rice in connection with the updated July Visa Bulletin.  To read her statement that explains to both how revising the Visa Bulletin is contrary to law, please go to THIS LINK.

Hopefully we will see other members of Congress step up and put pressure on the State Department on this very serious and important issue.

The Department of State has revised its July Visa Bulletin to reflect that all available employment-based immigrant visas have been allocated for Fiscal Year 2007.  As a result, USCIS has announced that it will reject any I-485 adjustment of status applications filed by aliens whose priority dates are not current under the revised July Visa Bulletin.  We will provide additional updates as we get them.

The State Department just issued the following update on July visa availability.  According to the updated Department of State Visa Bulletin, visas will not be available until October 2007.  We will keep you updated as we receive additional information.

From the Department of State:

The sudden backlog reduction efforts by Citizenship and Immigration Services Offices during the past month have resulted in the use of almost 60,000 Employment numbers. As a result of this unexpected action it has been necessary to make immediate adjustments to several previously announced cut-off dates.  All Citizenship and Immigration Services Offices have been notified of the following: 

The American Immigration Lawyers Association is hearing that the U.S. Department of State (DOS) plans to issue a revised Visa Bulletin for July 2007.  This revised Bulletin would retrogress some or all of the employment-based categories, likely to the point of being unavailable.  This new Bulletin is expected to be released on Monday July 2nd or Tuesday July 3rd.

Why is this happening?

It seems that the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) has been making an intentional push to adjudicate employment-based adjustment applications currently in the pipeline in order to exhaust the visa numbers for fiscal year 2007.  We have heard reports that the USCIS adjudicated as much as 40,000 adjustments in June alone. 

What happens from here?

If the DOS does issue a revised Visa Bulletin, then persons who have worked so hard to gather information and documents over the past three weeks to file their adjustment applications may have to wait until a visa number becomes available in the future.  After years of waiting, the July Visa Bulletin that was issued about three weeks ago created a glimmer of hope to hundreds of thousands of immigrants across the United States.  A revised Visa Bulletin that dashes these hopes is not the message our country wants to send to intending immigrants as we approach Independence Day - July 4th.

Stay tuned to www.bashyamspiro.com for updates.

Effective July 2, 2007, USCIS is temporarily suspending the Premium Processing Service for Form I-140 Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker.  USCIS said that it anticipates a substantial increase in the number of petitioning employers that will file Form I-140 petitions requesting Premium Processing Service in the month of July.  This is due to pent up demand for preference visa categories for which visas will become available according to the Department of State July 2007 Visa Bulletin.  USCIS expects the volume to exceed their capacity to adjudicate these premium processing requests.  The premium processing suspension will last until August 1, 2007.  At that time USCIS will determine whether it has the capacity to resume the Premium Processing Service for I-140 petitions.  Stay tuned to www.bashyamspiro.com for additional information.

In what could be described as simply 'remarkable,' the Department of State released its July Visa Bulletin which showed that the first three employment-based categories (EB1, EB2, EB3 (except “Other Workers”)) are current.  This means that all persons other than “Other Workers” who (1) are eligible to file I-140 Immigrant Petitions for Alien Worker  ("I-140"); (2) have pending I-140 petitions; or (3) have approved I-140 petitions can file their I-485 adjustment of status applications beginning July 1, 2007.   It is hard to predict whether these categories will remain current in August, but our guess is that they may not.  Therefore, it is important for anyone who has been waiting to file an adjustment application due to visa backlogs to contact their attorney immediately to get this process started.

For clients of our firm:

If you have not been contacted already, we will be contacting all of you shortly concerning the documents our firm needs to get the adjustment of status application filed for you in July.  In the meantime, you can get a head start by getting the following documents and information ready for us.  Once you have these documents ready, please call our office for further processing.  

1) Birth Certificates:  

On Monday, June 4^th, our attorney Laura Edgerton (Chair of the Carolinas Chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association), was one of a select number of guests to attend the groundbreaking ceremony for the new US Citizenship & Immigration Services field office in Durham.  The ceremony was attended by Congressman David Price and members of his staff, representatives from Senator Burr’s office, as well as numerous officials from USCIS and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).  The office is designed to be a 22,000 square foot state-of-the-art facility that will include biometrics processing and benefits processing in one facility.  The facility will be located at 201 Roycroft Drive, in the heart of the Research Triangle.  The office will be able to serve 400 people a day when construction is scheduled to finish in March of 2008.

Following a comprehensive review of more than 3900 public comments regarding the USCIS filing fee structure, USCIS announced a new filing fee structure that will be effective July 30, 2007.  To view the new fee schedule, please go to THIS LINK.  In return for the substantial increase in filing fees, USCIS has promised improved service in the adjudication of applications.  Applications or petitions postmarked or otherwise filed on or after July 30, 2007 must include the new fee or the case will be returned as rejected. 

The United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) is instituting new procedures for filing a Petition for Alien Worker (I-140) that requires an approved labor certification application.  These procedural changes are in response to the Department of Labor's (DOL) final rule on labor certifications published on May 17, 2007.

The new regulation will significantly impact the filing of Form I-140 petitions with USCIS because it:

* Prohibits substitution of alien beneficiaries on any permanent labor certification application after the application has been filed with the DOL.

* Establishes a 180-day time period within which a DOL-approved labor certification must be filed with the USCIS in support of a Form I-140 petition in order to remain valid.

* Requires that any labor certification approved by DOL prior to July 16, 2007 be filed with USCIS in support of a Form I-140 petition within 180 days after the effective date of the DOL final rule (July 16, 2007) in order for the certification to remain valid.

USCIS will continue to accept and adjudicate labor certification substitutions until the effective date of July 16, 2007.   

Please note that any I-140 petition that is filed outside of the labor certification effective dates outlined above will be rejected by the USCIS.

Also, the new DOL rules require that employers pay all attorney's fees and other costs associated with the labor certification process after the effective date of July 16, 2007.

Please stay tuned to www.bashyamspiro.com for additional updates.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced new Direct Filing instructions for a variety of immigration forms that were transitioned into the bi-specialization initiative.  Effective April 2, 2007, all Forms I-129 and I-539 are to be filed directly with the California Service Center or the Vermont Service Center, whichever is applicable.  USCIS will release filing charts that delineate the proper filing location, and will post those charts on its web site prior to April 2, 2007.  USCIS will accept Forms I-129 and I-539 filed in accordance with the old filing instructions during the first 15 days of implementation of Direct Filing (from April 2-16).  However, if a Form I-129 or I-539 is filed on or after April 17, 2007, and is not submitted to the correct filing location, it will be rejected and returned to the petitioner/applicant with the fee and instructions for proper filing.  Given that the filing period for the Fiscal Year 2008 H1B cap is about to begin, please stay tuned to www.bashyamspiro.com for further updates on where to file your H1B applications.  We will post the filing charts on our web site when they are released by the USCIS.