Any ideas on when the bill (if it becomes a law) will be effective from?
Any ideas on when the bill (if it becomes a law) will be effective from?
Hi Gurus,
I saw this in the CIR draft:
"Currently, there are four preference categories based on family relationships and 480,000visas are allocated to family. Under the new system there will be two family preferencecategories and they will cover unmarried adult children; married adult children who file before age 31, and unmarried adult children of lawful permanent residents. We are expandingthe current V visa to include those with family relationships. "
Does this mean that now there are only two categories and still there are 480,000 visas, there is a possibility to have more spillover from FB to EB? Agreed that might be a moot point when CIR passes. But technically is that a right assumption?
As per Rubio, no country quota:
Please listen to the video at 2:40.
http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/rub...4/16/id/499727
Not from what is in the summary. If that were true, the 120K visas would be a net cut from the current 140K and would exclude EB-4 and EB-5. And why keep EB-1 then? Merit based is a new track. The first 5 years of merit based visas are reserved to clear FB/EB backlogs. Merit-based is the new pathway for low skilled workers after those 5 years.
You are right that Merit visa is separate track. While the first five year reservation for EB FB backlog is right ... that itself starts in fifth year.
On another note - one important thing for all future GC holders is that parents of GC holders will be considered immediate relatives and be eligible for GCs.
Revised Summary (for EB immigration reform in order of Importance).
(Eliminating the Reuters piece now since it is a subset of the scribd version).
From Scribd
1. Elimination of numerical cap for
- Dependents
- EB1-A & B & C
- PHD in STEM
- Doctors
2. Change in composition of visas as follows
- EB1 - no quota - no limits
- EB2 + EB3 w US degrees - 40%
- EB3 - 40%
- EB4 - 10%
- EB5 - 10%
- Additionally a startup visa category (may be part of EB5 - except that startup visa will be much less stringent on investment and jobs created)
3. Separate Merit Based Track will start in fifth year aimed at reducing backlog for first five years and then will be open to low skilled workers as well.
- Merit based cap will keep increasing to 240K max as long as US unemployment is under 8.5% (this is quite funny since it barely exceeded 8.5% even under worst conditions in 2008-2009)
4. Immediate Relatives Definition Expanded
- Parents of GC holders will be considered immediate relatives (immediate relatives are exempt from numerical caps).
Our understanding will evolve .... so lets keep revising ...
Good luck to everybody.
Hi Q,
Under the categories with annual numerical limits the exact text is:
"US STEM Master Degree holders who earned the degree 5 years immediately before petition is filed: 40%"
Any insight into why they kept the condition of earning a degree 5 yrs immly before petition is filed?
Hi Q,
I don't think parents of GC holders are considered immediate relatives and they will not be granted any GCs I guess.
Thanks
Here is the text - read the red one. Unless .... I am making a mistake in interpreting it!
Quote:
The bill amends the definition of “immediate relative” to include a child or spouse of an alien admitted for lawful permanent residence, and the child or spouse of an alien who is accompanying or following to join the child, parent or spouse of a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident.
We can only guess ...
To me it looks like they want fresh talent right out of the college that an employer thinks is worthy of GC to get GCs faster - as opposed to talent that an employer took some time to file GC perhaps in the 6th year since employment when H1 might be coming to an end. In other words - they don't want an employer to wait till the end of H1 and keep talented people in perpetual limbo.
Again ... this is as good or bad guess!! I am not really very confident.
In fact I interpreted it this way:
The bill amends the definition of "immediate relative" to include
1. A child or spouse of an alien admitted for lawful permanent residence,
2. The child or spouse of an alien who is accompanying or following to join the child, parent or spouse of a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident.
I read it as follows - which is the only way to make sense if you read carefully:
The bill amends the definition of "immediate relative" to include
1. A child or spouse of an alien admitted for lawful permanent residence,
2. The child or spouse of an alien who is accompanying or following to join the child.
3. Parent or spouse of a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident.
Mind explain it over those 2-3 sentences above? Because #2 as feedback mentioned above doesn't make sense to me at all.
p.s. - in the following sentence
The child or spouse of an alien who is accompanying or following to join the child, parent or spouse of a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident.
lets take a subset e.g. "alien who is accompanying the parent of a LPR."
What does that mean? Looks quite senseless to me.
Spec - honestly I am struggling with the wording. I am glad I am not the only one. Clearly it is poorly written.
I think there is no doubt about
a child or spouse of an alien admitted for lawful permanent residence,
and the child or spouse of an alien
The fun really starts here onwards.
who is accompanying or following to join the child, parent or spouse of a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident.
My interpretation is that "who" refers to the alien who in the second sentence is yet to be admitted as against the first one where he is already admitted. If you interpret that way then all the rest makes perfect sense except the word parent. So remove the word parent and read it like I said and it is ok. Now if you insert word parent ... everything breaks down!!
Anyway ... I think at least we can agree that it is poorly written. May be Kanmani can help us understand.
p.s. - Oops ... now I can't find your post.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/busine...057_print.html
This is interesting.
Q,
Sorry about that!!
By the time I posted, I saw the subject had been done to death.
Here's an oddity.
The scribd document contains the sentence under debate
However, the document posted by AILA http://aila.org/content/default.aspx?docid=44052 contains a different sentence in the same placeQuote:
The bill amends the definition of “immediate relative” to include a child or spouse of an alien admitted for lawful permanent residence, and the child or spouse of an alien who is accompanying or following to join the child, parent or spouse of a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident.
which is much simpler and makes more sense.Quote:
The bill amends the definition of “immediate relative” to include a child or spouse of an alien admitted for lawful permanent residence.
THE QUEST FOR 60
I was interested in assessing the actual prospects for passage of the Bill in the Senate and will attempt to provide a brief prediction based on the Senators' previous stands on immigration and voting records.I am confident that the Bill will clear the Senate Judiciary Committee by 10-8 at the worst (most likely 12-8)
Once the Bill reaches the Senate Chamber I have broken down the possible YES & NO votes by party.I have not included a grey area for better clarity.I will tally the votes at the end and attempt a prediction
DEMOCRATIC YES VOTES (44)
Baldwin,Bennet,Blumenthal,Boxer,Brown,Cantwell,Car din,Carper,Casey,Coons,Cowan
(possibly Markey),Durbin,Feinstein,Franken,Gillibrand,Harkin ,Heinrich,Hirono,Johnson,Kaine,King,Klobuchar,Leah y,Levin,Menendez,Merkley,Mikulski,Murphy,Murray,Ne lson,Reid,Reed,Rockefeller,Sanders,Schatz,Schumer, Shaheen,Stabenow,Udall,Udall,Warner,Warren,Whiteho use,Wyden
DEMOCRATIC NO VOTES (10)
Baucus-From a very conservative state facing re-election next year
Begich-Same situation as above although from a state where immigration legal or illegal is not an issue
Donnelly-First time senator from a Republican state with no voting record as a Senator on immigration Bills.However he has a strong anti-amnesty record as a House Representative
Hagan-Facing tough re-election in a conservative state
Heitkamp-First time Senator with no record on immigration issues having never served i Congress before (previous attorney general in ND).Won election by a tight 3000 vote margin in a heavily republican state
Landrieu-Fence-sitter in tight votes facing another tough re-election
Manchin-Conservative Democrat who skipped the vote on the DREAM Act but clearly stated he opposes it
McCaskill-Strongly opposes any form of amnesty
Pryor-Most likely a no vote considering his tough re-election race next year.Cast the first no vote for cloture on gun control
Tester-Same situation as Baucus.Voted against the DREAM Act saying he represented the desires of his constituents
REPUBLICAN NO VOTES (30)
Ayotte,Barrasso,Boozman,Burr,Chambliss,Coats,Cobur n,Cochran,Corker,Cornyn,Crapo,Cruz,Enzi,Fischer,He ller,Inhofe,Isakson,Johanns,Johnson,Lee,McConnell, Risch,Roberts,Scott,Sessions,Shelby,Thune,Vitter,W icker
REPUBLICAN YES VOTES (15)
Alexander-Voting record shows no strong feeling against amnesty.Supporter of legal immigratio reform and sponsored Start-Up Act
Blunt-Co-sponsored Start-Up Act and has a moderate record on immigration
Collins-Another moderate GOP senator with numerous YES votes for illegals to receive instate tuition and welfare benefits
Flake-For obvious reasons
Graham-same as above
Hatch-This may surprise some but I strongly feel he will vote YES given his previous record.Also he will be 85 years old with the next election cycle in 2018 and will likely retire and will not face re-election
Hoeven-This was a tough call given his limited voting record and previous job being ND governor and no Congressional experience.However my feeling is that he is part of the younger,fresher breed of Republicans with hopefully a broad-minded approach
Kirk-GOP senator elected in Tea-Party wave in 2010 from a heavily Democratic state with a growing Latino population.
McCain
Moran-Same logic as Hoeven with strong pro-legal immigratin stance but no record on amnesty.
Murkowski-Same logic here as applied to Sen.Begich and can be persuaded
Paul-Think Presidential 2016! Has to back up his words and will atleast vote to start debate if not vote for the final product
Portman-Previous voting records do not suggest a strong antiamnesty stance and recent words on the subject seem reasonable and sympathetic
Rubio
Toomey-Another tea party freshman from my state and I strongly believe he will vote YES
The total tally at this point would be 59-40 in favor of cloture.This brings us to the question of Sen.Lautenberg's inability to participate in Senate proceedings at this time. His vote may become crucial and he is already being missed during the gun-control debate.According to NJ law,If he decided to retire before August he will be replaced by an appointee of Gov.Christie (GOP) and this will be a Republican till an election is held this November.If it is later than that then the appointee will continue till the next election in 2014 robbing the Democrats of a crucial vote
Please fell free to make your own calculations about the tally above.I feel I am probably over-estimating GOP yes votes but time will tell.These are the armchair observations of a sworn political junkie and I hope that the real situation of the ground is a lot more favorable to the Bill.I do not foresee a strong bi-partisan showing for this Bill and this will impact how the house deals with immigration
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...ar,immigration
Obviously the fate of the Bill will depend on how amendments are offered and handled and if some Senators are happy with their chance to amend it -then the tally will be much higher
Google, HP, Microsoft seek stricter visa rules for TCS, Infosys
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/enterprise-it/strategy/Google-HP-Microsoft-seek-stricter-visa-rules-for-TCS-Infosys/articleshow/19593629.cms
To the uninformed, Norman Matloff is a long time anti-immigrant.
gs1968,
Regarding your calculations for votes, many GOP senators who say publicly that they oppose amnesty, in fact supports it. Cornyn from texas is one of them.
Obama praising Rubio: http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.c...A-31C1D84601A1
To abcx13
Keep the dream going
http://dailycaller.com/2013/04/16/sc...ithin-8-weeks/
To vizcard
The quicker it moves through the Senate,the lesser the Republican support it will have and its pace will be much slower in the House. It is very likely that the House will pass its own version and reconcile it with the Senate Bill in conference. The House is the Republican backstop for the conservatives
They may be expecting this to pass after October and not want to make changes in the middle of the year. So, that's why might have put it for the FY2015. But that is one complete year will pass by without any changes. That is not good.
But Bill is great. With Recapture, Elimination of per country quota and exemption for dependents, we are golden.
So, ** was right in saying that the draft that was circulating was old.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/17/op...t.html?hp&_r=0
Can someone please post a comment here? The commentors, seemingly both Americans and some H1Bs who have been waiting for a while, are going crazy without having any conception of what the bill actually contains. They seem to think that this doesn't solve legal immigrants' problems - BUT IT DOES.
Someone needs to set these idiots straight. Most of the NYT picked reader comments are just plain wrong...
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/17/us...asures.html?hp
Let's hope this doesn't happen to our bill...
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/s744#overview
S.744 is the official bill. Please make your voice heard and actively support.
To gcq
Sorry for the delay in responding to your earlier response. I agree with you that the headcount is not easy and I was only trying to make a most reasonable, educated guess as to how the votes would fall.As I mentioned,I omitted "probably" yes or no to enhance clarity. My inclusion in one or the other group was based on past statements and voting record which unfortunately is very thin for some of the newer members of the Senate. 43 of the 100 senators were not in the Senate during the last CIR effort. Also as there has been no immigration legislation this session,it is hard to judge how much the views on immigration has changed among the Senators because of the recent elections.
In respect to your specific mention of Sen.Cornyn-I found this article interesting
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/frank-...b_3044880.html
To Q,Spec,vizcard,abcx13,rupen & others
Please feel free to critique my previous post and try and find additional support for a better vote tally. We need a hefty tailwind from a strong showing of the Bill in the Senate to prod the House into action and strengthen the Senate's hand during conference negotiations.I am sure we are all in agreement that the Senate Bill is going to be the more favorable one
PS-I was trying to judge support for the initial motion to proceed and cloture and not for the final Bill
Good question. I don't know the answer. In my case, that would definitely shorten the time to citizenship (one can dream!) but only if F1 counts.
House praises Senate bill - http://thehill.com/homenews/house/29...migration-bill