The U.S. Department of State has released the July 2012 Visa Bulletin. For the first time in many years, the employment-based, second preference (EB2) category contains a cutoff date for the rest of the world, Mexico, and the Philippines. This cutoff date is January 1,...
The pending I-485 inventory charts posted by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) were recently updated. These charts detail the number of pending employment-based (EB) adjustment-of-status (I-485) cases by EB preference category, country of chargeability, and month and year of the priority date. This...
With the ongoing backlog in the employment-based, third preference (EB3) category, many people look forward to using the strategy commonly referred to as an EB3-to-EB2 "upgrade." The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) recently confirmed a long-term favorable policy, which facilitates this strategy. It was...
The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has audited a significant percentage of PERM labor certification (LC or labor) cases since early 2012. The incidence of PERM audits became noticeably higher around February 2012. As explained here for the benefit of MurthyDotCom and MurthyBulletin readers, many...
The U.S. Department of State (DOS) has confirmed that the limit on immigrant visa numbers for fiscal year 2012 (FY12) has been reached. This information was communicated to USCIS on April 11, 2012, and was expected, based on the Murthy Law Firm's earlier communication with...
Developments in the employment-based, second preference (EB2) category for India and China in late 2011 / early 2012 generated both excitement and disappointment for many EB2 candidates. The rapid forward movement of cutoff dates in the visa bulletin for EB2-eligible candidates from India and China...
MurthyDotCom and MurthyBulletin readers were alerted on March 29, 2012 in our news item DOS Confirms Lack of Enough EB2 India / China Visa Numbers, that the U.S. Department of State (DOS) had internally retrogressed the EB2 India and China cutoff dates. The retrogression will...
The Department of State (DOS) provided the Murthy Law Firm with confirmation today that, effective March 23, 2012, the EB2 cutoff date has been retrogressed internally to August 15, 2007. This means that the USCIS will not be able to approve further EB2 I-485 cases...
Parts 1 and 2 of this article examine some of the major immigration developments in 2011, and analyze the potential impact of those developments for 2012. We previously discussed the forward movement of the EB2 India and China cutoff dates in the visa bulletin. Here...
This series of articles examines some of the key immigration developments of 2011. We discuss how these developments could affect MurthyDotCom and MurthyBulletin readers in 2012 and make recommendations for strategic planning on the U.S. immigration law front in 2012. Our focus here is the...
