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Back Issues of SHUSTERMAN'S IMMIGRATION UPDATE
Volume Nine, Number Ten
SHUSTERMAN'S IMMIGRATION UPDATE is the most popular e-mail newsletter regarding U.S. immigration laws and procedures with over 40,000 subscribers located in more than 120 countries.
Published by the Law Offices of Carl Shusterman, 600 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 1550, Los Angeles, California, 90017. Phone: (213) 623-4592
To subscribe, type in your name and e-mail address at http://shusterman.com/subscribe.html#subscribe and click on "Subscribe".
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Disclaimer: This newsletter is not intended to establish an attorney- client relationship. All information contained in this newsletter is generalized. Any reliance on information contained herein is taken at your own risk.
1. Employment-Based Immigration Numbers to Backlog Soon
2. Official Immigration Government Processing Times
3. H-1B Cap Reached for FY 2005: Strategies for Survival
4. Physicians: J Waivers Program Extended and Expanded
5. Immigration Trivia Quiz: The 2004 Election Quiz
6. Immigration Issues in the 2004 Presidential Election
7. Employment-Based Immigration: Secrets for Success
8. Schedule of Upcoming Immigration Law Seminars
9. Chat Schedule, Transcripts, Audios & Videos
10. Winner of the September 2004 Immigration Trivia Quiz
Since the House adjourned on October 9, the Senate-House Conference Committee will not meet to iron out differences between the two bills until after the November elections.
President Bush unsuccessfully tried to dissuade the House from including the anti-immigration provisions in the bill. On October 7, the Administration issued a three-page statement which expresses certain reservations about H.R. 10. The Administration's statement expresses, among other things, opposition to the overbroad expansion of expedited removal authorities contained in H.R. 10 as well as the overbroad alien identification standards proposed by the bill that are unrelated to security concerns. We link to the Administration's statement from our "September 11th" page at
Natives of all countries except the following may apply for inclusion in DV-2006 Lottery:
For the past few years, while the family-based numbers have been inching ahead, the employment-based numbers have all been "current", no backlog. This is about to change for the worse.
The November 2004 Visa Bulletin contains the following caveat:
"During the past two years, the visa allocation system compensated for reduction in CIS visa number demand by making very rapid advances in the visa cut-off dates. As the cut-off dates advanced, tens of thousands of applicants became eligible to file for adjustment of status at CIS offices. Heavy demand was expected as CIS began to address their backlog and finalize action on such cases. The Visa Office has been alerting interested parties to this possibility over the past two years, and this is exactly what has recently begun to happen. FAMILY: As CIS demand for visa numbers continues to increase, little if any forward movement of cut-off dates is expected during FY-2005, and the potential for retrogressions in certain categories cannot be ruled out. While retrogression of certain Family cut-off dates is not likely in the immediate future, it cannot be ruled out late in the fiscal year. This is because the CIS backlog is likely to include large numbers of applicants in all categories with priority dates well before the current cut-off dates. EMPLOYMENT: The increasing CIS use of numbers is likely to require the establishment of cut-off dates in one or more categories during FY-2005. Such action is expected in the Employment Third preference category as early as January."
In simple English, this means that the 3.5 million persons who have played by the rules established by Congress and waited in line to able to apply for permanent residence under the existing system of family and employment preferences are screwed!
The State Department is warning that the family-based numbers are unlikely to move forward and may even move backward in the coming year. Equally disturbing is that by January 2005, the employment-based numbers are expected to start developing backlogs.
If the increasing backlog in the family and employment categories were simply the result of the demand for green cards exceeding the supply, this would be completely justified. The United States admits approximately one million immigrants annually, more than any other country in the world. Anti-immigrant groups label this as "mass immigration" and call for the Congress to drastically decrease the number of immigrants. However, viewed in perspective, the numbers of legal immigrants admitted to the U.S. annually equals less than one-half of 1% of our population, not a "flood", but more like a "trickle". A majority of these immigrants are parents, spouses and children of U.S. citizens. The rest are close family members of U.S. citizens and permanent residents, persons with essential job skills and refugees.
The reason that the new backlogs are developing is not the result of increased demand, but because of the inability of the government to process applications for permanent residence in a timely fashion. If a U.S. employer needs the services of foreign-born professional, let's say a surgeon in a medically-underserved area, the process of obtaining permanent residence for the physician takes between three and five years. During the 1980s and the early 1990s, the processing time for an application for adjustment of status took 90 days or less. Now, the processing time for the same application is between two and three years. Yes, since 9/11, every applicant must undergo a security check. However, these security checks usually take a few weeks, or sometimes a couple of months, not years to complete.
The simple fact is that the Immigration Service (whether you call it the INS or the CIS) is not doing its job in an efficient manner. For starters, despite huge infusions of funds into the system, too many Immigration Examiners are still working on old Windows 95 computers. More importantly, many examiners are afraid to approve benefits applications. Their thinking goes: if the Indian or Filipino surgeon mentioned above turned out to be a terrorist, what would happen to your job if you were the one who approved his application? Under this type of pressure, it is far safer to mail out Requests for Evidence (RFEs) questioning the ability of his employer to pay his salary, the surgeon's qualifications, etc., etc. Finally, the government has done everything in its power to make the examiners at the CIS Service Centers as inaccessible as possible. Try calling them, faxing them or e-mailing them. All in all, the present system is a disaster.
And the magnitude of this disaster is seen in the recently released CIS "2003 Yearbook of Immigration Statistics" which we link to from our "CIS Page" at
However, for those of our readers with a little less time on their hands, we direct your attention to page 19, Table A - Immigrants Admitted by Major Category of Admission, Fiscal Years 2001-2003. This table shows that the number of persons obtaining permanent residence in the U.S. fell by 30% between 2001 and 2003. There was a huge decrease in the number of applications for adjustment of status which were approved by the INS/CIS which fell from over 650,000 to less than 350,000. The decrease in the number of approvals in the employment-based categories was particularly striking, falling from almost 180,000 in 2001 to just over 82,000 in 2003.
However, isn't the CIS reducing, or as DHS Secretary Ridge likes to say "eliminating", their backlogs by 2006? Time will tell. But the family and employment-based numbers that were lost in the last couple of years can never be recaptured even if Secretary Ridge's optimistic forecasts pan out.
The bottom line is that the U.S. economy stands to lose thousands of needed professionals, like the surgeon in the medically-underserved area, and family members will continue to endure separations of more than 20 years unless Congress steps up to the plate and changes the law.
The Immigration Service (CIS) lists its processing times for immigration petitions and applications on their web site. Most immigration applications and petitions must be submitted to one of the following USCIS Service Centers: (1) Laguna Niguel, California; (2) Lincoln, Nebraska; (3) Mesquite, Texas; and (4) St. Albans, Vermont and (5) the National Benefits Center in Missouri.
These service centers periodically issue lists of their processing times for various types of petitions and applications. We link to the latest list issued by each service center.
Warning: Processing times may appear faster on the official lists than they are in reality.
To see how fast (or slow) your service center is processing a particular type of petition or application, see our Government Processing Times Page at
The AAO's most recent published processing times (September 7, 2004) may be found at
To check the Official Processing Times of your Department of Labor Regional Office and your State Workforce Agency (SWA), see
The newly-revamped State Department web site contains a "Visa Wait List" page which permits readers to choose a particular U.S. consular post and learn how long it takes the post to process temporary, nonimmigrant visas. See
This represents an 11-month blackout period for H-1B visas. Of course, not all H-1B petitions are subject to the cap.
What's an employer in need of H-1B workers, or a potential H-1B worker, to do?
Remember, persons in H-1B status who are seeking extensions of stay or changing employers are generally exempt from the cap. So are persons whose employers are university-affiliated or university-related nonprofit institutions, or government or non-profit research institutions. Though the cap was reached only 10 days ago, we had encountered this situation not once, but twice. The human resources manager of a hospital called us because one of their pharmacists who is currently employed on F-1 student optional practical training was about to run out of status. Could they use premium processing to change her status to H-1B? No, but if the hospital were affiliated with a university, they could change her status to H-1B and save the $1,000 premium processing fee. After a little research, it turned that the hospital was, indeed, affiliated with a university. The pharmacist got her H-1B and the hospital saved $1,000 in filing fees. Same scenario for a physician who received a job offer for what turned out to be a university-related clinic.
You may also want to refer to the article in our September 2004 newsletter entitled "Immigration Legislation: E-Mail Congress and the Media" and ask your elected representatives to raise (or eliminate) the H-1B cap. There is a pending bill to exempt up to 20,000 foreign-born, U.S.-educated persons with graduate degrees from the cap.
This month's Immigration Trivia Quiz is entitled "The 2004 Election Quiz." See
Could it be because immigrants cannot vote?
This is exacerbated by the fact that employers and family members who sponsor immigrants don't always hold their elected representatives accountable for their votes on immigration bills.
Granted, reforms in the legal immigration system are not as politically sexy as the war in Iraq and the economy, not to mention the Scott Peterson trial or Britney Spears' latest marriage.
Still, both the legal (and the illegal) immigration areas should be certified by the President as "disaster areas" just as hurricane-ravaged areas in Florida. But where are the votes in doing this?
At the beginning of 2004, President Bush proposed an ambitious "jobs for willing workers" immigration reform plan. In response, he took so much heat, mostly from members of his own party, that he never even prevailed upon a friendly Senator or Representative to introduce a bill embodying his proposal in Congress. When, the bipartisan AgJobs bill which had over 60 sponsors was about to come up for a vote in the Senate, President Bush quietly asked Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) not to allow a vote on the bill. More recently, an anti-immigrant organization noticed that President Bush's immigration speech in January was missing on the English- language version of his web page, but was posted on the Spanish-language version of the page. Oh my, what an unfortunate oversight, said his spokesman who then added a copy of the speech to the English-language site.
One would think that the pro-business Republicans, in control of both Congress and the Presidency, would have passed legislation benefiting employment-based immigration. How about raising the H-1B cap? Or restoring a temporary visa category for registered nurses to assist beleaguered hospitals and patients?
John Kerry and the Democrats have, to their credit, introduced a number of far-reaching immigration reform proposals including the SOLVE Act which would fix a number of problems in this broken system. But since they lack the votes to get anything passed in Congress, their proposals are mostly symbolic. And the unions, their traditional supporters, continue to oppose raising the H-1B cap and any "guest worker" programs for nurses or any other needed profession.
With the 2004 elections around the corner, we have created a web page entitled "Presidential Elections - 2004" at
Be informed before you cast your ballot!
Dr. T, a Guatemalan national, is a successful Vascular Surgeon with a promising career in the U.S. He had one problem, however: as a physician in J-1 status, Dr. T would have to practice for three years in an underserved area to fulfill his J-1 visa requirements - a condition which would have been extremely detrimental to his career - or return to Guatemala for two years.
Therefore, we applied for a J-1 exceptional hardship waiver on Dr. T's behalf. Our argument was multi-layered: relying on published reports concerning corruption throughout Guatemala's government and health care system, we demonstrated the dangers the doctor would face if forced to return to his native country. Dr. T's wife, a registered nurse, would have been a victim of Guatemala's limited health care system if she were forced to move to that country. Additionally, she spoke no Spanish, and was responsible for the care of her elderly mother who had been diagnosed with cancer. Finally, Dr. T's two U.S. citizen children both suffered from debilitating speech impediments and would have been unable to receive proper treatment for their condition were they to be forced to relocate to Guatemala.
We are delighted to report that the Immigration Service granted Dr. T a J-1 exceptional hardship waiver, and currently practices medicine as a person of Extraordinary Ability in O-1 status. We have recently submitted Dr. T's Application for Adjustment of Status based on his citizen spouse.
Mr. O, a Mexican national and green card holder came to us with the following problem: his son was about to turn 21, and therefore lose his eligibility to gain permanent residency anytime in the near future based on his father's permanent resident status. Mr. O's son fell into the 2A preference category, which for Mexican nationals at the time was backlogged nearly 10 years.
We observed, however, that Mr. O's wife, the stepmother of his son, was a national from El Salvador with a pending green card application. Since the waiting times from El Salvador are far shorter than from Mexico, we opted to utilize the "alternate chargeability" rules contained in section 202(b) of the Immigration and Nationality Act. We sent a request for the CIS to expedite Mr. O's wife's permanent residency interview and she was able to adjust her status shortly before her stepson's birthday. Thanks to the quick thinking of my staff, Mr. O's wife obtained her green card just in time to provide her stepson a green card as an immediate relative.
For more information regarding how to obtain permanent residence through employment, see our "Green Card" page at
Practising Law Institute
37th Annual Immigration and Naturalization Institute
My Topic will be "Current Issues in Naturalization and Citizenship."
For program and registration information, see
The American Organization of Nurse Executives (AONE)
"Getting It Right: Foreign-Educated Nurse Recruitment"
- I am honored to have been selected to be the keynote speaker of the conference.
For program and registration information, see
Physician Recruitment Conference
Information not yet online.
Since 1999, we have served as the official immigration experts for About.com. We have participated in dozens of free chats since then. Our chats always focus on a particular subject.
Links to the transcripts of all of our chats are posted online on our "Chat" page at
Are your eyes getting tired from reading all of our information about immigration laws and procedures? Then sit back, close your eyes, and listen to any (or all!) of the following immigration audios:
We link to selected audio programs regarding immigration produced by National Public Radio at
Dear Mr. Shusterman,Editor's Note: Dawn, your knowledge of Zubin Mehta and classical music is truly encyclopedic!1. Zubin Mehta - born in Bombay, India - Is the Music Director of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and a conductor. He has many recordings, some are:
Classical Hits
( http://www.classicalhitsmusic.com)
Escape Through Opera
( http://www.escapethroughopera.com/)
Super Hits: Domingo
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/89277)
Super Hits: Rampal
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/89139)
My First 79 Years
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/89049)
The Essential Mozart
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/64225)
A Tenor's Valentine
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/60974)
Dvorak: Symphony No.5; Carnival Overture; The American Flag
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/60297)
Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro (Highlights)
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/60289)
Murray Perahia: 25th Anniversary Edition
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/63380)
Opera Overtures
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/63053)
The Domingo Collection
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/63027)
Liszt: Symphonic Poems
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/66834)
Lease Breakers
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/62628)
Greatest Hits: The Tsar
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/62683)
More Mozart's Greatest Hits
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/62682)
Greatest Hits: Cartoons
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/62368)
Greatest Hits: Rimsky-Korsakov
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/69250)
Greatest Hits: Dvorak
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/69248)
Greatest Hits: Sibelius
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/69252)
Prokofiev/Bartok: Violin Concertos
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/64503)
Greatest Hits: Liszt
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/64596)
Mozart: Serenade, K.361 "Gran Partita"
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/58950)
Bach: Violin Concertos; Double Concerto
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/66471)
Greatest Hits: Violin
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/66701)
Greatest Hits: Opera
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/66707)
Greatest Hits: Movies
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/66709)
Greatest Hits: Flute
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/66703)
Prokofiev: Piano Concertos Nos.2 & 4; Overture on Hebrew Themes
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/58966)
Sibelius: Violin Concerto; Bruch: Scottish Fantasy
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/58967)
Smetana: Ma Vlast (My Fatherland)
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/58944)
Greatest Hits: Brahms
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/64054)
Mahler: Symphony No.1 "Titan"; Adagio from Symphony No.10
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/53259)
Woody Allen Classics
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/53549)
Prokofiev: Piano Concertos Nos. 1, 3 & 5
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/52483)
Bruch, Vieuxtemps: Violin Concertos; Lalo: Symphonie espagnole
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/48274)
Prokofiev: Romeo and Juliet (Excerpts); Stravinsky: Le Sacre du printemps
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/48169)
Romance
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/48260)
THE GREAT FLUTE CONCERTOS BACH * MOZART * TELEMANN * VIVALDI
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/48184)
Favorite Arias by the World's Favorite Tenors
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/47176)
Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No.1; Violin Concerto
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/46339)
Tenors Anyone?
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/46635)
Bartok: Violin Concertos Nos.1 & 2
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/45941)
Chopin: Piano Concertos Nos.1 & 2
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/44922)
Suppe: Overtures
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/44932)
Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsodies
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/44926)
Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade & Russian Easter Overture
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/45652)
Rachmaninoff: Concerto No. 3 for Piano and Orchestra & Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/44761)
Wagner: The Ring (Highlights)
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/44657)
Prokofiev: Violin Concertos No. 1 & 2
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/42439)
Classic Gershwin
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/42516)
Bach: Double Concerto; Violin Concertos
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/38487)
Manhattan Soundtrack
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/36020)
An Isaac Stern Vivaldi Gala
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/38982)
Isaac Stern: 60th Anniversary Celebration
( http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/36692)
2. Irving Berlin - born in Eastern Russia - a famous hit of his was "Alexander's Ragtime Band".
3. John Lennon - born in Liverpool, England - One of his most famous songs is "Imagine".
I am a paralegal and use your site for immigration updates.
Dawn Ona
Seattle, Washington
Not to shortchange Mr. Berlin and Mr. Lennon, here is a brief biography of each of these singer/songwriters:
Irving Berlin, born "Israel Baline" in Mogilyov, Russia, immigrated to America at the age of five. Although he could not read a note of music, he composed some of the most popular and enduring songs of the 20th century including "God Bless America", "There's No Business like Show Business", "(I'll Be Loving You) Always", "Cheek to Cheek", "Blue Skies", "Puttin' on the Ritz" and "Let's Face the Music and Dance". Although he was Jewish, he also penned such classics as "White Christmas" and "Easter Parade". Someone once asked Jerome Kern, himself a brilliant composer, about Irving Berlin's place in American music. Kern replied: "His place in American music? Irving Berlin is American music."
John Lennon, born in Liverpool, England, also could not read music. As some of our more elderly readers may still remember, Mr. Lennon was a member of a rock group during the 1960s known as the "Beatles". Together with fellow Beatle, Paul McCartney, Mr. Lennon composed such rock classics as "I Want to Hold Your Hand", "She Loves You", "Eleanor Rigby", "Revolution", "Back in the U.S.S.R." and "The Long and Winding Road". Lennon and McCartney also collaborated on the groundbreaking album "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band". Despite his enormous contributions to American music and culture, the INS spent a great many years, and dollars, trying to deport him for a marijuana conviction in Great Britain. However, Mr. Lennon eventually prevailed (Thanks to his immigration attorney, the legendary Leon Wildes.) and was permitted to remain in the U.S. See
October 11, 2004
Carl Shusterman
Certified Specialist in Immigration Law, State Bar of California
Former U.S. Immigration & Naturalization Service Trial Attorney (1976-82)
Board of Governors, American Immigration Lawyers Association (1988-97)
Phone: (213) 623-4592 Fax: (213) 623-3720
Law Offices of Carl Shusterman, 600 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 1550
Los Angeles, California 90017
People are any nation's greatest resource, and the United States has been greatly enriched by the contributions of those who, though not born here, have pledged their lives, allegiance, and human capabilities to building this nation.
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