US Immigration News

United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced that 20,000 more H2B work visas will be made available to Haitian and other Central American citizens for 2022. More visas will be allocated for seasonal, non-agricultural guest workers as the number of migrants arriving at the US southern border with Mexico continues to surge.

 

More than 60,000 Afghan interpreters and other Afghan nationals who have applied for a US visa – including those who cooperated with US Armed Forces -  have been left stranded in Afghanistan, according to a Wall Street Journal report. Following the withdrawal of US troops back in August, thousands of Afghan citizens have sought to flee Afghanistan.

 

United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is planning a new visa and immigration fee structure that will prevent legal US citizenship being limited to the ‘very wealthy’, according to a report published by Newsweek. 

 

In a recent interview, USCIS director Ur Jaddou said: “Number one, we believe the US immigration system should not be reserved to the wealthy.”

Amid a shortage of nurses in the battle against COVID-19, many foreign healthcare workers have been waiting for their US visas to be granted in order to start work. However, senior health officials in the US say that they have seen ‘progress’ in efforts made to streamline the US visa process to allow more overseas health workers into the country.   

However, despite the progress, officials argue that more still needs to be done to make the US visa application process quicker.

Multinational tech firm, Microsoft, is the latest company to settle with the US Department of Justice (DoJ) over claims of US immigration-related discrimination.

The number of H1B visa holders in the US has slumped by 9%, representing the highest drop in a decade. Following an analysis of data released by the US Department of Labor (DoL), foreign engineering and mathematics workers on H1B visas fell 12.6% in the fiscal year ending 2021, compared with the previous year.