US Immigration News

Devyani Khobragade, the Indian diplomat at the centre of a diplomatic row between India and the US has returned to India without standing trial for visa fraud. Mrs Khobragade had been charged by a grand jury with underpaying her Indian employee Sangeeta Richard, in contravention of US visa law.

A member of the lower house of the US Congress, the House of Representatives, Darrell Issa,has told journalists that he does not think that immigration reform will pass in the US in 2014 because there is too much 'animosity' between Republicans in Congress and President Obama and the Democrats.

Representative Issa told TechCrunch magazine 'Comprehensive immigration reform is hard to do with the best environment between the executive branch (the President) between the House and Senate. We don't have the best opportunity'.

US sources report that the lower house of the US Congress, The House of Representatives, may vote on a comprehensive immigration reform bill in 2014. The vice president, Joe Biden said early in December that 'it's going to happen'.

Harry Reid, the leader of the Democrats in the US Senate, has predicted that John Boehner, the speaker of the House of Representatives ('The House'), will eventually 'cave in' and allow a vote on the Border Security, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Modernization Act 2013 ('The Act').

If Mr Boehner were to do so, there is a good chance that The Act, which has already been passed by the Senate, will become law.

Former Republican Vice-Presidential nominee Paul Ryan has told a conference that the Republicans want to remodel the US immigration system from 'family based immigration to an economic-based immigration'. Mr Ryan told the Wall Street Journal's CEO Council conference that this would require a 'step-by-step approach' and possibly as many as 'seven or eight different pieces of legislation.

The speaker of the House of Representatives, John Boehner emerged from a meeting with Republican members of the House (as it is known) on Wednesday 13th November 2013 and told journalists that there was no chance of the House passing a comprehensive immigration reform bill. This is the immigration reform bill that has already been passed by the Senate and which is supported by President Obama.