On Friday, United States Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) updated its internal policies related to the adjudication of naturalization applications of lawful permanent residents who partake in the marijuana industry in states like Pennsylvania and New Jersey, which have enacted laws permitting “‘medical’ or ‘recreational’ use of marijuana.” According to USCIS, if you smoke weed, you may lack the good moral character to become a U.S. » Read More
On Saturday, the Trump administration, through a Tweet from @realDonaldTrump at 9:47 p.m., floated the idea of sending all those entering at the border to sanctuary states and cities across the United States, where the president said the states and cities can take “care of” immigrants seeking admission, and in many instances asylum protection, at the United States border with Mexico, at designated ports of entry. » Read More
Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced the end of a month-long operation across 14 New Jersey counties, which led to the arrest of 128 immigrants. The operation focused “on the arrest of individuals convicted of serious crimes and are a threat to public safety,” noted John Tsoukaris, Newark’s Enforcement & Removal Operations (ERO) Field Office Director. » Read More
Only five days after the United States Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) opened the 2020 H-1B petition season, the agency announced on Friday that it had already received enough petitions to reach the 65,000 H-1B regular cap visas that Congress issues each fiscal year. » Read More
On Wednesday, nearly 300 people were arrested at a worksite raid in what Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has called the “biggest workplace immigration raid in a decade.” The raid at a Dallas-area receiving warehouse owned and operated by New Jersey based CVE Group Inc., a technology products company, was led by DHS’ Homeland Security Investigations (“HIS”) unit, with a team of over 200 federal agents. » Read More
The food was incredible, the information was plentiful, the interest was intense, and the questions were many—from whether the City of Camden could be designated an EB-5 Regional Center and how an undocumented individual could qualify for a mortgage through an ITIN lenders, to questions about landlords threatening to call Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) on undocumented tenants, and what remedies exist for to so many forced to live in deplorable conditions for fear ICE will knock on their door if they lodge a complaint. » Read More
On Friday, the New Jersey Immigrant Trust Directive went into effect—essentially ending any cooperation between the State and Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) on immigration enforcement matters. Announced in December of 2018 by New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal, the Immigrant Trust Directive effectively declared New Jersey a “sanctuary state.”
Effective last Friday, the directive prohibits state, county, and local law enforcement agencies, including police, prosecutors, county detectives, sheriff’s officers, and correction officers from doing the following:
Stop, question, arrest, search, or detain any individual based solely on actual or suspected immigration status;
Ask the immigration status of any individual, unless doing so is necessary to the ongoing investigation of a serious offense and relevant to the offense under investigation;
Participate in civil immigration enforcement operations conducted by ICE.
ABC-7 New York reported yesterday that Joe Giudice—husband of Real Housewives of New Jersey star Teresa Giudice—has been released from federal prison and is on his way to a federal immigration detention facility, where he will await the decision of an appeal of an Immigration Court order deporting Giudice to his native Italy. » Read More
Yesterday, United States Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) announced it immediately resumed premium processing for all H-1B petitions, following a halt on the service for several months to allow USCIS to bring current applications that were then pending for extended durations. » Read More
Starting April 1, 2019, United States Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) will accept new H-1B Quota-Based Visa Petitions for the 2020 Fiscal Year, for an employment start date of October 1, 2019.
USCIS’ regular H-1B visa cap limits annual H-1B approvals to 65,000 visas, with an additional 20,000 H1-B visas for individuals who earned a master’s degree or higher from a U.S. » Read More
