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The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is inviting public comment on proposed revisions to Form I-9, the form all U.S. employers are required to keep on employees to document that they are eligible to work in the United States. Comments will be accepted until May 29.
Key revisions to the form include: read more…
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will begin accepting H-1B visa petitions for fiscal year 2013 on Monday, April 2.
Petitions for the visas, which allow nonimmigrant specialists to temporarily work in the United States, will be considered accepted on the date USCIS takes possession of a properly filed petition with the correct fee. The agency advises that it won’t rely on the date the petition is postmarked.
As in past years, the congressionally mandated cap on H-1B visas is 65,000. Employers seeking H-1B status for nonimmigrant employees are accustomed to the cap being exceeded in just a few days, although the recession slowed demand for H-1B workers to the point that it took from April to November 22, 2011, for the cap to be met for fiscal year 2012 petitions, and the 2011 cap was never reached.
The U.S. Supreme Court has decided to hear arguments in Arizona v. United States, the lawsuit concerning the constitutionality of the state’s controversial immigration enforcement measure S.B. 1070. The bill originally was scheduled to become law in June 2010. However, shortly before it went into operation, the U.S. District Court for Arizona issued an injunction preventing four key parts of the measure from taking effect. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that ruling, and the following provisions of the law have remained stalled since:
Alabama employers may see some relief in a federal judge’s opinion on the state’s tough new immigration law even though most of the law was allowed to stand.
Chief U.S. District Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn ruled on September 28 that key parts of House Bill 56, which was signed into law June 9, can take effect. But she blocked enforcement of Sections 11(a), 13, 16, and 17.
A new North Carolina state law soon will require use of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ (USCIS) E-Verify system to check if workers are legally entitled to work in the United States.
Under the new law, signed by Governor Bev Perdue on June 23, all employers in North Carolina that employ 25 or more workers eventually will be required to use the system. The new law will take effect at different times based on an employer’s size and type: read more…
Following through on the strategy announced in April, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer filed a petition yesterday asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review the lower court decisions blocking implementation of key provisions of S.B. 1070, Arizona’s tough immigration law.
A federal district judge in Arizona blocked four provisions of the law, formally known as the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act, from taking effect in July 2010. The injunction allowed certain aspects of the law to go into effect but blocked other provisions, including one making it a crime for an illegal immigrant to solicit, apply for, or perform any work in the state.
Temperatures aren’t the only things heating up this week. On Wednesday, June 15, the Obama administration shifted the ever-intensifying immigration dialogue back to federal turf when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced that it will begin conducting its second round of immigration audits this year.
Authorities with ICE, a division of the Department of Homeland Security, declined to name the businesses that will be targeted or their locations, but at least 1,000 companies soon will be subject to inspection of their I-9 forms and other hiring records. The businesses range in size and reportedly include those “critical to infrastructure and key resources.”
Thursday, May 26, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Legal Arizona Workers Act (Act), an Arizona employment law that allows the state to sanction employers that knowingly or intentionally employ “unauthorized aliens.” The first provision of the Act punishes certain employers that hire unauthorized aliens by suspending or revoking their business licenses. The second provision requires employers to check the immigration status of new employees through E-Verify, a federal online employment verification program.
The Chamber of Commerce of the United States, along with several business and civil rights organizations (collectively, Chamber), filed a federal lawsuit against the individuals tasked with administering the Act. The Chamber argued that federal immigration law preempted the two provisions of the Act. The district court determined that federal law didn’t preempt the Act because the law imposed licensing conditions only on businesses operating within the state and the U.S. Congress hadn’t expressed the intent to prevent states from requiring employers to use E-Verify. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the district court’s decision.
By Geetha Adinata, Ford & Harrison LLP
Another domino has fallen in the changing landscape of immigration law. Following in the footsteps of states such as Arizona, Georgia has passed legislation addressing the issue of illegal immigration within its borders. Last week, the Georgia Senate adopted and amended HB 87, which includes numerous provisions that will affect employers doing business in Georgia. Governor Nathan Deal plans to sign the bill when it reaches his desk.
A new final rule on verifying employment eligibility through the Form I-9 process has been adopted and is to take effect May 16.
Identical to an interim rule that has been in effect since April 3, 2009, the new rule makes changes regarding documents used to verify eligibility for employment in the United States. As with the interim rule, the final rule prohibits employers from accepting expired documents and revises the list of acceptable documents to remove outdated documents and make technical amendments. Also, documents applicable to certain citizens of the Federated States of Micronesia and the Republic of the Marshall Islands have been added.
The list of acceptable documents employees may present to employers is still divided into three sections: List A documents showing identity as well as employment authorization, List B documents showing identity only, and List C documents showing employment authorization only.
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