My Grandmother, Emma, never finished elementary school but she was wise in many ways. She taught me not to cause problems for myself by trying to punish someone else. I often think of this when I read the news about immigration. I see “solutions" that cause problems for the country by punishing immigrants. Two things in particular that I read in the last few days made me think of my Grandmother’s advice. First Read More
The Intersection of Immigration and Marijuana
Under Federal Law, marijuana is considered to be a controlled substance and admission of even casual and legal use of marijuana can trigger admissibility issues for foreign nationals. Immigration law provides Criminal Grounds of Inadmissibility, Trafficking-related Grounds of inadmissibility and even Medical related grounds of inadmissibility. Criminal Grounds of Inadmissibility An alien who has been convicted Read More
USCIS Processing Delays have reached Crisis levels
USCIS is the government agency that oversees lawful immigration to the U.S. Some of the services that they provide include naturalization, management of the process that allows legal permanent residents and U.S. citizens to petition for residence for close relatives and management of the process that allow individuals to work in the U.S. – temporarily or permanently. USCIS is entirely funded by filing fees. NO Read More
It is H-1B season!
H-1B visas are available to allow U.S. businesses to hire professionals on a temporary basis for three years. The visa may thereafter be renewed for an additional three years. To qualify, the person hired must have at least a bachelor’s degree or higher in a specific occupational specialty and must be offered a position that requires that specific degree. The occupational specialties that are generally accepted Read More
Happy New Year
This month has been busy with a lot of immigration-related news. I hope that 2019 has been good to you so far. USCIS remains open during the government shutdown. I have received many questions about whether immigration is still working during the shutdown. The answer is yes, for the most part. Offices remain open and interviews continue to be held. USCIS will continue to accept petitions and applications for Read More
Reality Check – We are not being invaded by caravans of criminals entering through open borders.
At the end of President Obama’s term, the number of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. was at its lowest level since 2007 with the sharpest declines occurring during the Obama presidency. The Great Recession played a part as well as the sharp rise in deportations. Thankfully most of the deportations during this time were of those with a criminal history. That is not the case at this point. The Pew Read More
Searching for Naturalization Records through USCIS
This month I thought I would write about something a bit lighter in nature than most of my blogs. Given that we are all immigrants, many wish to learn more about their family histories and to obtain copies of immigration related historical documents. One way to start is to obtain naturalization records and certificates for your ancestors. Prior to 1906, foreign nationals could be naturalized in any court of record Read More
Voter suppression by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
There is much talk in this country about voter suppression. Typical voter suppression tactics include purging voters, gerrymandering, instituting voter-ID laws, closing polling places and preventing felons from voting. I will not discuss the voter suppression tactics in general but would like to point out the voter suppression that is occurring via USCIS slow walking applications for legal residence (which can lead Read More
Crimes and Immigrants – the Myth
Every month I struggle with what to write in my monthly blog. There is no shortage of subjects. The problem I have is to decide what of many topics to use and to try not to make it too political but with immigration issues, it is really impossible to stay away from political commentary. Just reading the morning papers give me numerous ideas and then I look at my inbox with emails from AILA (the American Immigration Read More
Welcome Home Campaign
Recently there has been so much bad news about new immigration policies and procedures that it is hard to decide what to talk about in this blog. Every day brings new things to be outraged about. While the assault on “illegal” immigration continues to escalate, the assault on legal immigration continues under the radar. I am writing an article on what commentators have called the “invisible wall” – all of the ways, Read More
