US Immigration News

Employers applying for L-1 visas to fill managerial and specialist knowledge job vacancies under ‘blanket’ approval are now required to complete a new, longer form that further probes the employment history of potential workers. The new form was introduced on August 29, 2016.

Concerns over US immigrant screening continues to grow following a spate of terror attacks that hit the US in the space of 12 hours in September 2016. Attacks in New York, New Jersey and Minnesota on September 17 – 18 have fuelled speculation that US immigration authorities are failing to identify threats to national security.

Applications for the 2018 Diversity Immigrant Visa Lottery (DV-2018) started to be accepted from October 4, 2016, as announced by the US Department of State.  This year people from Ecuador can apply under the green card lottery scheme. Applicants must submit their entries electronically between noon on October 4, 2016 and noon on November 7, 2016, Eastern Standard Time.   Only a few days left.

US employment-based green cards are becoming more readily available for many immigrants coming to the United States on EB employment based immigrant category visas, from October 1, 2016. As announced in the October edition of the Visa Bulletin, the US Department of State will be processing applications under the EB-1 immigrant visa category for all countries of birth as of October 1.

In June 2016, Workpermit.com reported how top US Army General, John Nicholson, urged US lawmakers to preserve the Afghan immigration visa programme for those Afghan civilians who aided the US-led coalition in the fight against the Taliban. Three months on, and more than 12,000 of them are still waiting for their US visa.

According to the Counsellor for Public Affairs at the US Embassy in Jamaica, Joshua Polacheck, applications for US non-immigrant visas – mainly the B-1 business visitor visa and B-2 visitor for pleasure, but also including work visas such as the E-1 treaty trader and E-2 treaty investor visas and