Special immigrant religious workers are currently able to petition for permanent residence in two distinct categories. One category is for those who enter the United States to carry on the vocation of minister in a religious denomination. The other category is for those who have...
California Service Center (CSC) views and clarifications on various immigration matters and procedures were provided to American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) on January 28, 2009. This summary of the highlights of that report, including the 30-day timeline to respond to Requests for Evidence (RFEs), transfer...
The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) Service Center Operations / ISD Committee (SCOPS) recently released answers to questions posed to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) service centers. These questions were from a meeting on August 20, 2008. Some of the questions addressed the "sunset"...
MurthyDotCom and MurthyBulletin readers were provided with information on the National Interest Waiver (NIW) option for international medical graduates (IMGs) in our August 29, 2008 article, NIW for Physicians Completing J-1 Waiver Service. In contrast, the labor certification-based permanent residence (green card) option for IMGs...
As reported in last week's MurthyBulletin, the U.S. Department of State (DOS) Visa Bulletin holds some very good news in the employment-based, second preference (EB2) category for nationals of certain countries. The cutoff dates for India and China were advanced in excess of two years...
The Administrative Appeals Office (AAO) released a decision upholding the denial of an EB1 (extraordinary ability) petition in which the employer failed to demonstrate that the sponsored foreign national had extraordinary ability in a particular field. (Please note that the extraordinary ability petition is exempt...
Misprinted I-94 cards, used by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in early 2008, are causing problems with Social Security number issuance. According to the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA), CBP received approximately one million I-94 arrival-departure cards that were missing the first digit. They utilized...
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) responded to questions regarding green card renewals, expediting N-400 applications, and I-551 (temporary evidence of permanent resident status) stamps during the April 2008 National Stakeholder Meeting. Clarification on these matters is provided here for the benefit of MurthyDotCom...
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) responded to questions regarding green card renewals, expediting N-400 applications, and I-551 (temporary evidence of permanent resident status) stamps during the April 2008 National Stakeholder Meeting. Clarification on these matters is provided here for the benefit of MurthyDotCom...
The USCIS responded to questions posed by the American Immigration Lawyers Association's liaison committee and released information in April 2008 regarding a number of matters relevant to MurthyDotCom and MurthyBulletin readers. These include consideration of a multi-year Employment Authorization Document (EAD) and Advance Parole (AP)...
