Dear Readers: 

This week we present another special issue covering major developments in immigration law. A few days ago, one of the most significant immigration bills in many years was introduced with strong bipartisan support. The Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act (SAOIA) is co-sponsored by power hitter Senators McCain (R-AZ), Graham (R-SC), Brownback (R-KS), Kennedy (D-MA) and Lieberman (D-CT). An identical bill has been introduced in the House also with bipartisan sponsorship. We are likely to see at least one or two competitor bills and the President has yet to signal whether he supports SAOIA, so this legislation has a long way to go. But the chances of serious immigration legislation happening this year are much better than in years past and the competitor bills are likely to overlap in many respects with SAOIA.  

So what are some of the things SAOIA does? First, it provides substantial new tools to beef up and secure the borders of the US. The idea is that the country will finally secure the borders and create legal ways to ensure that those coming to the US can do so in a manner where we can verify that they do not pose a security threat. That means creating a genuine guest worker program - an H-5A visa - that is generous and meets the President's goal of matching up willing employers with willing workers and ensuring that Americans seeking employment are not overlooked. It also creates an H-5B visa that allows those out of legal status to get back into legal status. These workers will pay substantial fines for this privilege. The bill contains provisions that will allow H-5B workers to seek permanent residency and it is this issue that is likely to be an area of disagreement in the competing bills. 

SAOIA also will substantially reduce family immigration backlogs by making more green cards available across the board and will also do the same on the employer side by doubling green card numbers, allowing borrowing of unused numbers from prior years and reallocating caps in the different categories to ensure that numbers are more efficiently distributed. 

The bill also cracks down on "notarios" who are non-lawyers either holding themselves as lawyers able to assist immigrants with their legal work or those who claim to simply be assisting in filling out forms and not providing legal services. The bill makes it clear that filling out forms IS legal work. Violators may face private lawsuits and substantial fines under SAIOA. 

We will track SAIOA as it moves throught Congress. In the mean time, in this special issue we include a detailed summary of the bill's provisions. 

***** 

We also include a summary of the just released AC21 memorandum that has been in the works for nearly five years. A number of the "grey areas" surrounding adjustment portability, H-1B portability and seventh year H-1B extensions are finally cleared up in the new memorandum. The memorandum was surprisingly worker friendly and has much good news. 

***** 

In firm news, the latest issue of AILA's Immigration Law Today contains a column I've written on technology. This month covers my favorite subject - cool gadgets for immigration lawyers (as well as other folks) that I discovered at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. You can find the article linked on our site at www.visalaw.com/news/.  

Finally, as always, we remind readers that we're lawyers who make our living representing immigration clients and employers seeking to comply with immigration laws. We would love to discuss becoming your law firm. Just go to http://www.visalaw.com/intake.html to request an appointment or call us at 800-748-3819 or 901-682-6455.

Regards, 

Greg Siskind