In the “no good deed goes unpunished” category there should be included a May 2004 memorandum from the USCIS’ Bill Yates regarding issuance of requests for evidence (RFEs). The memorandum was a response to complaints by immigration lawyers that USCIS examiners were issuing requests for additional documentation when they had all the evidence they needed to positively rule on a case. Following 9/11 and the never published “zero tolerance” memorandum (which was later rescinded), many examiners were asking for more documents than necessary to decide on a case in order to cover themselves should questions ever later arise.

The May 2004 Yates memorandum gave examiners a freer hand to approve a case without an RFE as well as to deny a case that is clearly deniable without an RFE. Unfortunately, examiners used the memorandum to deny many cases that were not clearly deniable. Fortunately, Bill Yates has rescinded the May 2004 memo and replaced it with one that makes it quite clear that RFEs are to be issued in cases where the case is not clearly deniable. More importantly, he provides examples of what this means. The memorandum is welcome and will hopefully lead to better decisions.

*****

Friday I’m presenting a session at the Texas Bar’s annual CLE program in Houston. My talk will be on incorporating the Internet into your daily immigration law practice. Specifically, I’ll present a hypothetical case and show step by step where the Internet can be used to save time and produce better results. For information, go to www.texasbarcle.com.

Next week I’ll be presenting at the Physician Recruiting Expo in Orlando. I’ll be discussing physician immigration issues. You can find information on that program at www.physicianrecruitingexpo.com.

And speaking of physician immigration, I am the author of a chapter on immigration in the new book The Top Legal Mistakes Physicians Make. You can purchase the book online at www.seak.com.

On March 10, beginning at 2:00 p.m. ET, Greg and Arda Beskardes will participate in an audioconference, "The New PERM Rules: DOL's Latest Answer to Labor Certification
Reform," sponsored by the Bureau of National Affairs, Washington, D.C.'s foremost publisher of news and information for professionals in business and government. The program will offer an informative discussion of the new regulatory requirements and give you a chance to post your
questions live. You can find information about the program and also register for the show at:
http://www.bna.com/promotions/audio/agenda0310.htm.

Attorney Greg Siskind and Siskind Susser staff member Gilda Bollwerk co-authored an article in the February 20 issue of La Prensa Latina providing an update on the 2006 Diversity Visa Lottery (en Espanol). Click here to read it.

The latest weekly issue of Siskind's Immigration Bulletin is now online. Click here to read it. The table of contents follows:

1. Openers

2. The ABC’s of Immigration: Immigration Issues Related to Lay Offs and Corporate Downsizing

3. Ask Visalaw.com
4. Border and Enforcement News

5. News From The Courts

6. Government Processing Times

7. News Bytes

8. International Roundup

9. Legislative Update

10. Guest Column: Is There a Visa in the House? Why AC 21 May Not Help Us After PERM, by Gary Endelman

11. Yates Memo Provides Instructions for RFEs and NOIDs

12. AgJobs Bill Reintroduced in Congress

13. Merger of ICE and CBP Considered

We have been reporting for several weeks on H.R. 418, the Real ID Act. This is another piece of legislation that sounds great at first glance, but then a host of problems are discovered the more you examine it. The bill purports to be about making driver’s licenses harder to fake. That sounds easy to support. But then you learn that the federal government is mandating standards that states must meet without actually providing states with the funding to implement those standards. And states that offer driver’s licenses to people without legal documents will be punished even if the state has made the decision that for public safety reasons they want to ensure that all drivers on the road get licensed. Finally, the rule will make it much more difficult for people with non-immigrant visas to get drivers licenses. They are going to have to reapply every year. If your state is like my home state of Tennessee and has a terribly disorganized and delay-burdened DMV, having to get re-licensed every year will be a major burden for people who are here legally. And it basically takes us to the point of having a national identification card without having any public debate on this highly controversial idea.

The bill also contains harsh provisions that allow judges to dismiss asylum cases based on inconsistencies in the applicant’s testimony even if the applicant had a good reason for being inconsistent and even in the discrepancy is not germane to the main issues in the case. The US has dramatically toughened its rules regarding asylum over the last few years and there is no evidence to support the notion that this change in the law will make us any safer from terrorism.

This week, Margaret Stock writes a guest commentary on another controversial section of the law governing charitable contributions. We also will report on the status of the bill in the Senate. The Senate is not expected to be interested in keeping some of the more controversial sections of the bill, but the politics on the legislation are volatile right now.

We also have an interesting commentary by regular contributor Gary Endelman regarding the interplay between the new PERM program and the rollback in EB-3 numbers. Speaking of EB-3 numbers, the unskilled EB-3 worker category has suddenly backlogged by several years. Applicants in that category need to get their cases filed by the end of the month in order to avoid being stuck waiting to file for several years.

*****

In firm news, I received a copy of a book this week in which I have authored a chapter. The book is called THE BIGGEST LEGAL MISTAKES PHYSICIANS MAKE. I have written, not surprisingly, the chapter on immigration mistakes. The book is available online at the publisher’s web site at www.seak.com.

Attorney Greg Siskind wrote a chapter in a new book published by Seak. Mr. Siskind wrote the chapter about immigration mistakes made by physicians. Click here for more information.

We've posted the latest processing times for the Texas Service Center. Click here to see it.

Here's the table of contents for this week's Siskind's Immigration Bulletin. Click here to get to any of the articles.

1. Openers

2. The ABC’s of Immigration: Bringing Mandamus Suits Against the USCIS

3. Ask Visalaw.com

4. Border and Enforcement News

5. News From The Courts

6. Government Processing Times

7. News Bytes

8. International Roundup

9. Legislative Update

10. State Department Visa Bulletin

11. Guest Column: Somethin's Gotta Give: PERM And The Pressure For Larger Immigrant Quotas, by Gary Endelman

12. Guest Column: H.R. 418 and Charitable Donations, by Margaret D. Stock

13. Spouses Who Filed in New York Are Not Getting Fast-Tracked

14. State Department Official Indicted on Visa Fraud Charges

15. Visa Mantis Program Extends Time in US for Some Scientists and Students

16. House Backs Real ID Act

Attorney Greg Siskind and Siskind Susser staff member Gilda Bollwerk co-authored an article in the February 6 issue of La Prensa Latina outlining the specifics of the Real ID Act, which was recently passed by the US House of Representatives (en Espanol). Click here to read it.

We've posted the latest processing times for the Nebraska Service Center. Click here to see them.

Attorney Greg Siskind wrote an article in the February 1 issue of Indus Business Journal to insure that permanent residents understand their rights, know how to maintain their status, and know how to comply with various legal requirements. Click here to read it.

We've posted the State Department Visa Bulletin for March 2005. Click here to see it.

We've posted the latest processing times for the California and Vermont Service Centers and the National Benefits Center in Missouri. Click here to see them.

Attorney Greg Siskind and Siskind Susser staff member Gilda Bollwerk co-authored an article in the February 6 issue of La Prensa Latina detailing the Violence Against Women Act (en Espanol). Click here to read it.

The latest monthly issue of Siskind's Immigration Professional is now online. Click here to read it.

We've posted the latest processing times for the Texas Service Center. Click here to see them.

There are a couple of key immigration issues to watch this week in Washington. The first will have happened by the time you likely will see this email. President Bush is expected to bring up his immigration proposal in the State of the Union address to the nation tonight. Many pundits believe the plan has little chance of passing since it is controversial in Bush’s own party. But the President insists he is willing to use political capital to make it happen and several key allies in the Congress have given him vocal support. So look for particular language in the speech to signal whether the President truly intends to push on this issue.

The other very controversial immigration proposal in the news is the introduction of the REAL ID Act, the driver’s license bill, which would make it very difficult for both undocumented as well as non-immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses. The bill will also tighten rules in asylum cases, expand terrorism-related deportation grounds and provide for expanding the fence along the US-Mexico borders. Congressman James Sensenbrenner, the chair of the House Judiciary Committee is pushing very hard for his bill and is threatening to hold up all other immigration-related bills if he does not get what he wants. A competing bill has been introduced in the House by Virginia Republican Tom Davis which only covers the driver’s license issue and this may stop the momentum toward a quick vote on the Sensenbrenner bill that seemed to be building. Davis is chair of the powerful Government Reform Committee

We have learned from Capitol Hill sources that the bill could come up for a vote as early as next week. The bill voted on is likely to be a combination of the Davis and Sensenbrenner measures.

The Sensenbrenner bill is a classic example of legislative overkill. The recently enacted Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act requires the Secretaries of the Transportation and the Homeland Security departments to promulgate regulations that will establish minimum security measures for drivers' licenses and identification cards. The REAL ID Act, goes further and will cause substantial headaches for the millions of people in the US on temporary visas who are in complete compliance with our laws. And the bill does not address how states will deal with the inevitable safety issues that will result when undocumented drivers simply choose to drive without licenses rather than proving they know the rules of the road.

Some political observers believe the Davis bill will move because it will make it tougher for Democrats to explain a “no” vote when the asylum provisions are not included in the bill. The driver’s license provisions are seen as being more popular with the public.

We've posted the latest processing times for the Texas Service Center. Click here to see them.

Attorney Greg Siskind was named one of the top 101 lawyers in Tennessee by Business TN magazine. Click here to read about it.

Attorney Greg Siskind and Siskind Susser staff member Gilda Bollwerk co-authored an article in the January 30 issue of La Prensa Latina detailing the 18-month extension of Temporary Protected Status for nationals of El Salvador (en Espa?ol). Click here to read it.

LexisNexis.com recently posted an article written by Attorney Greg Siskind about citizenship rules for people born outside the United States. Read about one of the most complicated areas of US citizenship law: the passage of citizenship to children born outside the US to one or more US citizen parents. (We've also linked more articles by Mr. Siskind that were posted on LexisNexis.com.) Click here to read it.

Here's the table of contents for the January 28 issue of Siskind's Immigration Bulletin. Click here to get to any of the articles.

1. Openers

2. The ABC’s of Immigration: Immigration Under the Violence Against Women Act

3. Ask Visalaw.com

4. Border and Enforcement News

5. News From The Courts

6. Government Processing Times

7. News Bytes

8. International Roundup

9. Legislative Update

10. Supreme Court Holds That Inadmissible Aliens Cannot Be Detained Indefinitely When They Cannot Be Removed

11. Supreme Court: Deportees to be Sent Home Without Consent From Home Country

12. DHS Conducted 2004 Year-End Review

13. USCIS Proposes Changes to H-2B Program

Attorney Greg Siskind and Siskind Susser staff member Gilda Bollwerk co-authored an article in the January 23 issue of La Prensa Latina explaining citizenship rules for individuals born outside the US. Click here to read it.

We've posted the latest processing times for all the Service Centers. Click here to see them.

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