The American Immigration Lawyers Association reports the following from meetings with senior Department of Homeland Security officials:

·         The H-1B cap is likely not to be hit until mid-March

·         The USCIS is working on a memo to address the re-adjudication of established facts as well as unreasonably abusive requests for evidence in employment-based non-immigrant and immigrant visa petitions

·         CBP and CIS are working on establishing a procedure to correct I-94s with errors (AILA members have been reporting that neither agency wants to assume responsibility for correcting them)

·         USCIS is taking the position that in adjustment portability cases involving concurrently filed I-140/I-485s, the I-485 must be pending for 180 days AND the I-140 must be approved.

AILA is also reporting the following based on meetings with senior Labor Department officials:

·         The PERM program regulations are finished at DOL and are awaiting final clearance from the Office of Management and Budget. The program will not likely debut until later this summer.

·         DOL is setting up new backlog reduction centers, but they have not yet budgeted funds to support the effort.

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The DHS sent a reminder to schools approved in SEVIS under the preliminary enrollment regulation that the deadline for completing the SEVIS enrollment process, including payment of the required fee and having a site visit, is May 14, 2004. In addition to explaining the process that preliminary enrollment schools must use to pay their SEVIS enrollment fees and have a site visit scheduled, the memo encourages those schools complete the necessary procedures by February 1. To view the DHS memo, go to http://www.nafsa.org/sevp.

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USCIS Associate Director of Operations William Yates issued a memo on January 8, 2004 extending the validity of civil surgeon endorsements on Form I-693, Medical Examination of Alien Seeking Adjustment of Status.  This policy will be in effect until January 1, 2005.

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The Office of Administrative Law Judges of the Department of Labor found that an employer’s failure to make displacement inquiries of secondary employers was a violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1182(n)(1)(F). 

The statute provides that:

“The employer will not place the nonimmigrant with another employer (regardless of whether or not such other employer is an H-1B-dependent employer) where-- (i) the nonimmigrant performs duties in whole or in part at one or more worksites owned, operated, or controlled by such other employer; and  (ii) there are indicia of an employment relationship between the nonimmigrant and such other employer; unless the employer has inquired of the other employer as to whether, and has no knowledge that, within the period beginning 90 days before and ending 90 days after the date of the placement of the nonimmigrant with the other employer, the other employer has displaced or intends to displace a United States worker employed by  the other employer.”

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President Bush has signed Presidential Proclamation 7750, To Suspend Entry as Immigrants or Nonimmigrants of Persons Engaged in or Benefiting from Corruption. The proclamation restricts immigrants and nonimmigrants “who have committed, participated in, or are beneficiaries of corruption” from entering the US in order to protect the international activity of US businesses, US foreign assistance goals, US security and the stability of democratic institutions and nations.

There are four categories of individuals who are restricted from entering the US under the proclamation.  The first is public officials or former public officials who have accepted an “article of monetary value or other benefit” in return for not carrying out their public functions, or has caused serious negative effects for US national interests. 

The second includes individuals who provide or offer to provide an “article of monetary value or other benefit” to the public officials in exchange for not carrying out their public duties or negatively affecting US national interests.  The individuals in these two categories are designated by the Secretary of State.

The third category includes public officials or former public officials who misappropriate public funds or interfere with public processes, such as the judicial or electoral processes, or have negatively affected US national interests.  And the fourth category includes spouses, children and other dependents of those in the first three categories, who benefit from the “articles of monetary value or other benefits” received by those individuals.

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The North Carolina Court of Appeals has ruled that the state must expand Medicaid to cover illegal immigrants to allow for longer treatment for serious health problems.  This ruling can expand the number of medical treatments that illegal immigrants in North Carolina are able to receive and may allow hospitals that already treat illegal immigrants to receive more Medicaid reimbursements.

The panel of appellate judges found that the state’s Department of Health and Human Services had misapplied Medicaid rules in the treatment of an undocumented worker from Mexico, Benito Luna.  Luna was admitted to Moses Cone Hospital in Greensboro, North Carolina in December 1999, where doctors discovered that he had cancer of the spine.  Two days after being admitted, doctors operated on Luna and gave him chemotherapy for the next month.  State and county Medicaid officials paid the hospital for the surgery but not the chemotherapy.

Medicaid does not fully cover illegal immigrants, but federal and state regulations require that the program must cover treatment for emergency medical services given to the poor.  State officials had denied the chemotherapy claim because they felt that the surgery had stabilized Luna’s condition.  The court found that the state and a lower court had not considered that Luna’s health could have seriously deteriorated without the chemotherapy treatments.

The appellate decision can be found online at http://www.aoc.state.nc.us/www/public/coa/opinions/2004/020557-1.htm.

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Four workers at Mohawk Industries Inc. filed a lawsuit Tuesday accusing the carpet-making company of suppressing wages by hiring illegal immigrants.  The workers allege that Mohawk recruits and hires illegal immigrants and knowingly accepts fraudulent identity documents, violating the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations statute.

Mohawk contends that they obey the law, but workers say that the company hires illegal immigrants because it can pay them less than US citizens and legal immigrants and because illegal immigrants are unlikely to pursue worker’s compensation claims if they are hurt on the job.

Howard Foster, a Chicago attorney who specializes in class action racketeering lawsuits, initialized the suit and based his argument on the racketeering law, which allows private lawsuits against people or organizations with a pattern of violating certain federal statutes, including immigration laws.

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Thomas C. Wright, Jr., of the Virginia House of Delegates, is drafting a bill that would prohibit illegal immigrants from carrying a gun.  The bill is intended to give police new authority when trying to crack down on terrorism and drug trafficking.

Federal law already makes it illegal for an illegal alien to carry a gun, but it’s difficult to convict anyone of the offense in a timely manner.  A state law like the one Wright is proposing would help police act quickly against offenders.