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27 06, 2021

Life is About to Get Better For Pending “U” Victim Visa Applicants

By |2021-06-27T11:17:26-05:00June 27th, 2021|Categories: General, Employment Authorization / Work Cards in the U.S.|

By:  Richard Hanus, Esq. Published June 27, 2021 Undocumented foreign nationals in the U.S. who have been the victim of certain types of crimes have a potent option in the U visa to legalize their status and eventually attain U.S. permanent residence (green card) and even citizenship.  Now that option is even more powerful as a recently announced policy will allow applicants to have a chance to obtain an Employment Authorization Document (EAD) – allowing for lawful employment while waiting out the current 5 year processing backlog. The U visa was created by our Congress in 2000 with the idea that victims [...]

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13 06, 2021

Dipping our Toes In Legalizationland: ICE Prosecutors To Exercise Discretion Again

By |2021-06-13T10:40:41-05:00June 13th, 2021|Categories: General, Removal / Deportation Proceedings and Court Hearings|

By:  Richard Hanus, Esq. Published June 13, 2021 With 12 million or so foreign nationals residing in the U.S. without lawful immigration status, agents of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement department have no shortage of work to carry out.  Indeed, this has been our nation’s steady reality for decades and our most recent ex-President ascended to office with promises to leave no undocumented person behind, and deport them all.  Well, of course, that mass deportation promise never came close to being kept although it certainly provided fresh red meat for gleeful rally celebrations. Now we are [...]

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17 05, 2021

Reversal of Bad Immigration Policy Just Quietly Happened and the Consequences for Immigrants and Their Employers are Huge

By |2021-05-17T13:26:29-05:00May 17th, 2021|Categories: General, DHS / Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS)|

By:  Richard Hanus, Esq. Published May 17, 2021 Attaining lawful permanent resident (Green Card) status by way of a job offer and one’s advanced education and/or experience is among the most obstacle ridden processes on our nation’s immigration benefits menu.  There are countless ways the process can fail, whether the worker is abroad waiting to obtain an immigrant visa from a U.S. consular post or even more so, when the applicant is in the U.S. on a temporary visa and looking to “adjust” their status to permanent resident. The latter category of applicants and their employers received extraordinarily good news in recent [...]

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2 05, 2021

SCOTUS Issues a Game Changer for Those Fighting Deportation

By |2021-05-02T20:14:34-05:00May 2nd, 2021|Categories: General, Removal / Deportation Proceedings and Court Hearings|

Published May 1, 2021 By Richard Hanus, Esq. The U.S. Supreme Court this past week issued a major decision regarding the way foreign nationals must be notified to appear for their initial court date for removal (aka deportation) proceedings.  The decision was noteworthy in many regards, including that it bulks up the rights of immigrants fighting to remain in the U.S. and that it was penned by a notoriously conservative judge, with other conservatives on the court joining in the opinion. A “Notice to Appear” or NTA is the charging document issued by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) [...]

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20 04, 2021

The New Director of Homeland Security’s Immigration Agency Has Her Work Cut Out for Her

By |2021-04-20T15:38:05-05:00April 20th, 2021|Categories: General, DHS / Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS)|

Published April 20, 2021 By Richard Hanus, Esq. U.S. immigration law is many things to many people.  To the vast majority of the American public, it is what makes the loudest news in the general media.  These days it’s all about what goes on at the U.S. southern border, and how things are, or are not, under control.  But that story is just a tiny sliver of our nation’s overall immigration law picture. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (US CIS) – the arm of U.S. Department of Homeland Security that processes important immigration benefits such as employment authorization documents, advance parole [...]

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6 04, 2021

Putting an End to Visa Bans and Blank Space Rejections

By |2021-04-06T09:53:48-05:00April 6th, 2021|Categories: General, Asylum in the United States, Non-Immigrant Visas for Temporary Workers / H-1B|

Published April 6, 2021 By Richard Hanus, Esq. Visa Bans:  On April 20, 2020, as it became obvious the pandemic was neither a hoax nor a societal challenge that would simply “disappear”, President Trump tweeted:  “In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!”   Well, immigration, in its entirety was not suspended, although the tweet was geared to present that very message to specific segments of his base.  In a set of tweets in [...]

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22 03, 2021

The Green Card and Naturalization Processes Just Got Easier

By |2021-03-23T06:16:46-05:00March 22nd, 2021|Categories: Citizenship / Naturalization and the N-400 Application, Family-Based Immigration Law, General|

Published March 22, 2021 By Richard Hanus, Esq. The Biden Administration recently removed two significant Trump-era obstacles for applicants seeking lawful permanent residence (Green Card) and U.S. Citizenship.  These obstacles were seen by many as purposeful government strategies aimed to cut down on the issuance of U.S. immigration benefits for foreign nationals and without a solid public policy purpose.  Just as important, it seemed the Trump administration’s implementation of the rules were designed to send a loud political message to a particular audience, that we have enough foreigners as part of U.S. society, even ones with legal status. Obstacle to Green [...]

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7 03, 2021

It’s the Time of the Season, When Love of the H-1B Runs High

By |2021-03-07T16:08:28-06:00March 7th, 2021|Categories: General, DHS / Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), Employment-Based Immigration Law, Foreign Exchange Student Visas to the U.S., Non-Immigrant Visas for Temporary Workers / H-1B|

Published March 7, 2021 By Richard Hanus, Esq. It’s H-1B work visa registration season, and by the end of this month, US Department of Homeland Security/Citizenship and Immigration Services (US CIS) will have completed its selection of 85,000 lucky registrants for the H-1B visa lottery.  Starting Noon EST on March 9, 2021, the online H-1B visa registration period will open for the fiscal year 2022 - which itself starts October 1, 2021.  The registration period will last a little over two weeks, and close at Noon, EST on March 25. During this period, petitioning employers and their representatives will complete petitioner and prospective foreign worker information and submit [...]

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22 02, 2021

Biden Reaches For the Stars and Starts an Important Immigration Conversation

By |2021-02-22T17:44:49-06:00February 22nd, 2021|Categories: General, Amnesty for Immigrants in the U.S., Asylum in the United States, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), Employment Authorization / Work Cards in the U.S., Employment-Based Immigration Law, Family-Based Immigration Law, immigration reform, U.S. Immigration Law and Legislation, Undocumented Immigrants and Workers in the U.S.|

Published February 22, 2021 By Richard Hanus, Esq. It’s been more than 20 years since our nation has enacted any significant legislation to allow our nation’s undocumented population an avenue to legalize their status.  The most recent provision,  Section 245(i) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, was neither simple nor straightforward.  It was potent, though, affording hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of otherwise law abiding foreign nationals without immigration status a path to permanent residence (green card).  Its primary requirements included having a qualifying family member or employer to petition them along with the payment of a financial penalty for violating their status. Fast [...]

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26 01, 2021

6 Big Immigration Happenings Under President Biden

By |2021-01-26T16:11:29-06:00January 26th, 2021|Categories: General, Amnesty for Immigrants in the U.S., Asylum in the United States, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), DHS / Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Employment Authorization / Work Cards in the U.S., Green Cards, immigration reform, Lawful Permanent Residence in the U.S., Removal / Deportation Proceedings and Court Hearings, U.S. Immigration Law and Legislation, Undocumented Immigrants and Workers in the U.S.|

Published January 26, 2021 By Richard Hanus, Esq. Even before President Biden took office, the nonstop flow of news relating to immigration law began.  How will things be different with President Biden when it comes to immigration law and policy, especially after 4 years of the Trump administration’s harsh tone and policies?  In the past 10 days, the Biden administration has announced dozens of important immigration initiatives, some being Executive Orders taking effect immediately and without Congressional approval and others like proposed legislation, requiring Congressional approval and having no immediate impact.   Below are the 6 most far reaching of these orders [...]

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