Late-Breaking News! Bill May Provide Limited Relief for Retrogression and H2Bs Posted May 06, 2005 H.R. 1268, a bill that was primarily intended to provide supplemental appropriations for defense, the global war on terror, and tsunami relief, has been passed in different versions by both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. However, it contains some important immigration provisions. The House and Senate announced on May 3, 2005 that they have reached an agreement on the final wording of the Bill. This Bill is not yet enacted into law, but it is expected it will be signed by the President and, thereby, finalized into law. If the Bill becomes a law, it will bring both positive and negative immigration consequences. ©MurthyDotCom Retrogression Relief ©MurthyDotCom The Bill would amend the provision of AC21 that released certain unused visa numbers to all employment-based categories. AC21 permitted unused employment-based numbers from 1999 and 2000 to be used in employment-based cases in future years. These were numbers from countries that did not use their full allotments of visa numbers for each preference category. The bill would permit unused numbers in 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004 to also be used in future years. There is a change, however, with respect to how these unused numbers will be allocated. Previously, the unused numbers could be used for any employment-based cases. In the Conference Report for H.R. 1268, the additional employment-based visa numbers are allocated solely to Schedule A cases for nurses and physical therapists. The report only permits the Schedule A cases to receive up to 50,000 total visa numbers under these provisions. This would be quite helpful to employers of nurses and physical therapists, occupations that are in high demand in the U.S. ©MurthyDotCom H2Bs ©MurthyDotCom The Bill would make some temporary changes to the H2B program. Watch for details of this provision in a future article to be published on MurthyDotCom and in the MurthyBulletin. ©MurthyDotCom Real ID ©MurthyDotCom Not all provisions of the Bill would be favorable for immigrants. The Real ID Act is a part of this Bill and is a controversial measure discussed widely in the media. We at The Law Office of Sheela Murthy will cover the Real ID Act in more detail in a future article for MurthyDotCom and MurthyBulletin readers. ©MurthyDotCom Conclusion ©MurthyDotCom We remind MurthyDotCom and MurthyBulletin readers that this is still a bill and not yet a law. When it does become law, we will provide updated information, as it becomes available. To better understand how a bill becomes a law, please refer to our article explaining this Legislative Process, available on MurthyDotCom. © 2005 The Law Office of Sheela Murthy, P.C. All Rights Reserved
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