EB1C Petition

To all my Indian and Chinese friends who completed graduate studies in the US:

We have all gone through several hardships to make a life in this country. Several of us came to the US at the time Indian IT industry was growing. Many of us also had job offers in the Indian IT industry which we declined to pursue higher education in the US - we went through a hard life, stayed away from our families, lived just above the poverty line, bought really old cars (many of us did not even buy cars), shared rooms with several roommates and worked harder than a full-time job to get a degree and a training to make ourselves useful in this country. We sacrificed to achieve our dreams.

Today, we are doing respectable jobs - jobs that matter to this country and we are making a difference in our place. And there are thousands like us. We love this country, we love its people and we love its culture and we want to be a part of this society. We have been doing well in our jobs as well, and we are getting promoted to important roles with our employers. Yet we are made to wait in long lines to become permanent residents. We still try to accept all of that as a part of the life in this country.

Then, there are individuals who chose to take jobs in their countries after their Bachelors and earn while we were striving to make a life here. In the time we spent in grad schools learning difficult concepts and making creative contributions to our fields, these individuals did not learn any new skills that would help advance their fields. They got promoted in less competitive environments and became managers with their companies. Now they are transferring to the US on L1 visas and getting GCs by the fast track even while we are waiting in long lines.

At this time, USCIS has raised the bar considerably on EB1A/B categories. Even individuals with PhDs and multiple years of experience in their field of research do not qualify. To attain an EB1A/B visa, one needs to show that he/she "has risen to the top of their field". Yet L1B transferees are able to get EB1C visa with relative ease. Hence, there exists an inconsistency in USCIS policy on EB1 issuance -- with thousands of managers in a large corporations, how can one who has recently become a manager be considered as having "risen to the top"? To add insult to injury, if we get promoted to managerial positions in our companies we still will not qualify for EB1 visa.

Several renowned public policy scholars have been have been talking about it and America is now beginning to realize that outsourcing is only an economic liability and not a boon. Hence, outsourcing companies are increasingly adopting tactics that look less like 'business' and more like 'mafia'. Infosys already is facing lawsuits for felony offenses in at least a couple of US states. It only further underscores the moral bankruptcy of these companies -- they are willing to bend any laws and encroach any boundaries to profit from this country. In addition to lost American jobs, there is also the indirect economic cost of their unethical practices -- lost opportunities for the genuine applicants.

President Obama himself has publicly called for increasing the tax rate on companies that outsource American jobs. Given where things are headed with public policy on outsourcing, it just does not make sense that USCIS grant visas on the fast track to repeat offenders so that they can outsource more jobs and hurt more genuine green card applicants.

Obviously, there is an urgent need for the USCIS to revisit it's EB1C review process. With the entire EB1 quota being used in this financial year, the time to act is now, and it is crucial that we act. The good news is that a logical fix to this system will not require to passage of a law. An internal memo similar to the Kazarian memo for EB1A/B will help USCIS establish the appropriate standards for EB1C.

Here are a few suggestions to start with:

1. Sign the petition started by ImmigrantRbnHd by clicking here: http://www.petition2congress.com/639...dulent-filing/
2. Send an email to Senator Grassley by visiting his contact page: http://www.grassley.senate.gov/contact.cfm . If you can, please take the time to write about your personal struggles while pursuing higher education in the US. This will make him understand the value of the people who are being left behind due to lack of a logical review system.
3. Post on other forums and raise awareness about this matter.
4. Join the google group: http://groups.google.com/group/opposeeb1cabuse . The group was started on 03/21/2012. We will wait for an initial enrollment period (~1 week) before starting active discussions.
5. Reach out to your friends and colleagues and ask them to do the above items.