According to the Federal Register, the Employment and Training Administration (ETA) of the Department of Labor is amending its regulations related to the H-1B and H-1B1 programs to generally require employers to use Web-based electronic filing of labor condition applications.  The final rule also implements technical and clarifying amendments to ETA’s H-1B and H-1B1 regulations.  Among these amendments are provisions to reflect Congressional reinstatement of certain evidence and obligations applicable to employers that are H-1B dependent or have committed willful violations of H-1B requirements.  This final rule is effective on January 4, 2006.

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A report released last week by the Pew Hispanic Center suggested that recent Mexican immigrants in seven cities across the United States typically traded jobs in Mexico for the prospect of work in this country.  According to the survey, most undocumented Mexican immigrants in the United States had been employed in Mexico.  Once in the United States they found that their undocumented status was no barrier to being hired and opted to keep the jobs they could obtain in the US rather than return to their native country.  The report states that the current workers in the US were taken from the heart of the Mexican labor force.  The full report is online at http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=58.

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According to the Associated Press, groups of protesters rallied nationwide last weekend against undocumented immigration and relaxed border security.  The protests, dubbed “Stop the Invasion” were organized in 19 states, but in several cities the rallies had poor turnouts.  In one California suburb, the AP reported about two dozen protesters gathered outside a store with American flags and were then surrounded by more than 100 immigrant supporters who shouted “Racists go home.”  One man was arrested for assault.