On May 12, 2016, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will begin premium processing for cap-subject H-1B petitions requesting premium processing, including petitions seeking an exemption for individuals with a U.S. master’s degree or higher. USCIS first announced in a news release that it would temporarily adjust its premium processing practice due to the...

 

Family-Based Projections. Because most family-based demand is generated at overseas posts, DOS has greater visibility into those categories and is able to move the final action dates more consistently than the employment-based categories, which has a high percentage of USCIS-based (adjustment of status) filings. As a result, dramatic fluctuations in the family-based categories tend...

Washington D.C. - April 18th, 2016 - Today, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in United States v. Texas. The highest court will now decide whether the President’s deferred action initiatives announced in November 2014, known as expanded DACA and DAPA, move forward.

The lawyers arguing for the deferred action initiatives made a convincing case...

Final Action Date Movements Consistent with Prior Predictions. The Final Action Dates in the April 2016 Visa Bulletin are consistent with the U.S. Department of State (DOS) predictions from last month. In February, DOS predicted that we would continue to see forward movement of up to five months in EB-2 and EB-3 China, and...

March 9th, 2016, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released an copy of the final rule pertaining to optional practical training (OPT) for certain students with degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). The official version of the final rule is slotted to be published in the Federal Register on March...

The U.S. Department of State (DOS) March 2016 Visa Bulletin shows advancement in the employment-based third preference (EB-3) worldwide category. The final action (FA) cutoff date in the employment-based second preference category for India also advances, but at a slower pace than in recent months. The EB-1 and EB-4 categories remain current in the...