Dear Readers:

This is one of the most important weeks in immigration law in many months. We have the release of a major regulation as well as passage of several key immigration provisions in Congress. In this issue, we provide information on each of these major developments. We’ll return next week with our regular features and the rest of the news.

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Today, the USCIS will release the long-awaited H-1B rules relating to the “bonus” quota of 20,000 H-1Bs Congress set aside for graduates of US graduate degree programs. We received an advance copy of the regulations and in this week’s ABCs of Immigration article, we provide a summary of the new rules.

In this week’s ABC’s of Immigration article, you’ll find a summary of the changes brought about by the new H-1B regulation.

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We also have been waiting to find out what Congress is going to do on the REAL ID Act, H-2B visas and EB-3 retrogression. Agreements have just been reached on all three and we report on the final version of each measure separately in this issue. The controversial REAL ID bill passed largely intact with some minor softening. H-2B reform passed unchanged from the Senate version. EB-3 retrogression relief passed, though in a more limited fashion both in terms of numbers and because it is limited to nurses and physical therapists only.

The REAL ID Act is mostly bad news and we include this week a press release from the American Immigration Lawyers Association criticizing Congress and the President for passing this legislation without any public hearings. One good piece of news, however, in REAL ID was the last minute addition of a provision eliminating the annual cap on asylum adjustment applications. 10+ year waits will now be a thing of the past for asylees wishing to move toward getting a green card and eventual US citizenship.

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I know many of our readers are members of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. I rarely speak publicly about AILA elections, but I did want to publicly endorse my friend Tammy Fox Isicoff, a candidate for AILA Secretary. I’ve known Tammy for many years and admire her for her fighting spirit when it comes to defending the rights of immigrants and pushing for sensible immigration laws. She is savvy when it comes to working with the media and an excellent immigration lawyer as well. She’ll make an excellent addition to the AILA executive committee and I urge people to cast their vote for her during the upcoming election.

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In firm news, I was interviewed about REAL ID yesterday on Bloomberg Radio regarding REAL ID. I explained why REAL ID sounds good in theory to some, but is, in reality, a really bad idea. The radio show host who interviewed me was supportive of the bill so we had a polite and interesting debate.

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Regards,

Greg Siskind