Now for the rest of this year the EB2 queues for China and India are merged. Visa allocations will be solely based on Priority date. So for example if India has many priority dates that are before China's, India may end up getting more visa allocations. The same holds true if China has earlier priority dates than India does. That's how I inderstood it and I thought I would try to explain it to some who did not. Otherwise sorry for stating the obvious.

Read the Sec 202 a 5 I posted in 1st page and corresponding links. It clearly says that the left over visa numbers under each category in every Q can be assigned with out country limits. Is there any one who is reading it other wise (or) Is there any text in the bill I am possibly missing?

^^^^^

Is there anyone like my case - concurrently submitting 140 and 485 who submitted WITHOUT current employment letter ?

sry guys, i have to pull out. I have a big essay that has been assigned and i cant spend the time needed to make a good entry. sry!

i'll make one later and just post it in showcase :)

Wow. period.

I had no idea the situation was this bad. We were on flippin Grey hound buses, from NY to Buffalo and then two immigration people board the bus and start talking to us.

We were just four students doing our Master's going to Niagara and we had no clue that we needed a passports to travel there, But the thing that pissed me off the most was the attitude of one of the officers.

Here's the actual conversation.

Bus driver before we reach Syracuse: "Immigration officials come up to check documents 90% of the time".

Us: "Dude, you should've told us this in New york city! Why are you telling us this now?"

Officer1: "Sir, your documents"
Me(extremely low tone, pretty scared): "Sorry officer, I didn't realize we needed a passport to travel to Niagara falls. We aren't going over to Canada..."

Officer1 (Voice raising, everyone in the bus was looking at us by this point): "I hope you realize what you're saying. YOU ARE IN DIRECT VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW. I have people from 40 countries in my station now and I can take you there RIGHT now."

Me (still scared): "I'm sorry, I thought this was domestic travel, I didn't realize we needed a passport for this. I have my international driver's permit and my Student ID Card as identification"

Officer1:(Passengers looking on, Officer 2 jumps in after this): "You realize you are in MY country? This is not a valid form of ID. Drivers license allows you to drive. This does not constitute a valid immigration document"

(They talk)

Officer 1: "Are these valid?"
Me: "Yes"
Officer 1: "Are you sure? Because I'm going to call up someone to check your immigration record. What Visa are you on?"
Me: "F-1?"
Officer 1: Name?
Me: I tell him.

He calls someone up, finds out, checks my status and returns my ID.

And then Officer 2 goes on this really crappy speech which went like - "Now, I hope you realize that we at the United states have many welcome visitors from all over the world...Blah blah.. you just need to carry your Passport with you wherever you go".

Not sure if this is the fabled "good-cop, bad-cop", but damn I was so pissed at the end of it all. I almost wanted to say I want a lawyer, but we were on a vacation, long weekend, didn't want to ruin everything :(

Damn, I miss India now.



I work at El centro, CA. Its right on the border with Mexico abt 30-40 miles I guess. Each time the immigration officer stops me w/o fail & checks for my papers. Law is I guess, if you are traveling from 40 miles of US border with Canada/Mexico, you need to carry immigration papers.

Thanks. could you try yahoo, google and msn groups on immigration too.
when you type these words you will see several such forum names. Select the ones with more membership and become a member. Thgen post messages. Emails sent in these forums go to each member.

others, pls suggest more websites and help in posting IV messages on them.
sure will do it and will update as i post

Well consult a attorney and discuss with him. Your case looks complicated to me, i would suggest you to get a good attorney to sort this mess.

Thanks. I appreciate your enthusiasm and seveal other members on this thread. Pls help us in the action items listed by IV so that we can be well prepared to undertake any campaign early next year. Let me tell you, the campaign like last week will happen again because IV will keep pushing through every crack in the door until our goal is achieved. At such times we need to have enough membership muscle, financial capability to sustain and execute the effort. All this is not built in one day but during times like this when DC is quiet.


Sure . Agree with you and Stand next to you and IV with full of my energy and resources.

sammas..

Ahh.. Thought I missed something in the loong document..

Thanks..

off topic. Since you went to get yout visa stamped, was there any dealy due to the new PIMS verification system?

Which consulate did u goto? Was this renewal of your H1b stamping? How long did it take for you to get the passport back?


thx


Well, this is NOT a cooked up story. This happened to me yesterday at Harlingen (HRL) Texas airport.

On January 16, 2008, I went to Mexico for H1-B visa stamping at Matamoras US consulate. I got my H1-B visa stamped and returned to Brownville, Texas.

On January 17, 2008, I was at Harlingen (HRL), Texas airport for my final destination.

One of the TSA security personnel�s is in process of verifying my ticket before proceeding to security check. As every one knows, we must present one of the government issued PHOTO-ID to them to clear the security check. I have shown my driver license and he has cleared the security check (name check).

I was about to proceed further for security screening; mean while, a Police Officer came to me and asked me following questions.

Sir, are you a US citizen?

I said, No

Then, he asked me, can I see your immigration documents.

I have shown my passport to the police officer.

He looked at H1-B visa and I-94 and asked me; who do you work for?

I said my employer�s name.

Later, he gave me my passport back.

Now,

I have asked the Police Officer few questions

1. Sir, I�m in domestic traveling, is it mandatory to carry my immigration documents at all times?

Police Officer said, as per the US LAW, all non-immigrants must carry immigration documents and passport at all times.

2. What would you have done to me, if I had failed to present my passport?

Police office said, I could have DEPORTED you.

3. Sir, it is not possible for any one to carry passport at all times. Could the LAW allow me to carry photo copies of my passport and immigrations documents?

Police office said, No. Technically, you must carry original documents at all times.

I would advice you to carry Passport at all times.

I did not know this until Police Officer told me about this LAW.

P.S: BTW, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) level is in �ORGANE�.

just found this interesting link about doing business in the world

http://www.doingbusiness.org/economyrankings/

it's on worldbank.org

You can post. Just type the messages on the left hand side panel.

Got it. Thank you.

Only the ones who were on OPT.

I was on OPT but my I140 has a different number than the one on my OPT.

Congrats Googler, you have given so much to this community. You totally deserve the good news! Have a couple of cold ones on us...

and then june....then july....and so on and so forth visa bullietins......:D

I dont see anything good happening this year..duh :confused::confused:

If people were not busy preparing for Sept 18th DC rally, this thread would have been 20 pages plus, but if you REALLY want to discuss some thing then here it is........

Employment Based (EB) Green Card (GC) Laws
� The yearly GC quota is 140K. This includes GC for spouse and children. On an average, GCs are given to ~60K families.
� Each country is allotted 7% (of 140K) GCs (equally distributed among EB-1, EB-2 and EB-3) plus any unused visa from other countries. For India, average numbers of EB GCs issued in last seven years were 32K (~12K families).
� As per USCIS Ombudsman report
o Between 2001-07, USCIS was not able process all applications and hence ~155K GCs went waste as unused GCs in a year can not be reused in following years. This was most likely due to resource constraints.
o The report estimates the submission of 500K-750K (yes 500K+) AOS applications between June 1 and August 17 2007.
o FBI security checks may be the single biggest obstacle to the timely and efficient delivery of immigration benefits.
� There were ~200K pending EB Adjustment of Status (AOS) or I-1485 applications as of June 1st.
� So far EAD renewal has been taking around 3 months. Due to the volume of applications, EAD renewal may take 3-9 months. Thus, you may have to apply for renewal more frequently.
� FBI security check backlog is likely to get worse, because the August USCIS fee increase has prompted a 50 percent rise in new naturalization applications so far this year.
� EB Immigration reform does not have enough support in Congress (failure of SKILL, STEM ..). As a matter of fact, it does not even get enough support to make it debatable, let alone final voting.
� The laws need to be changed and the process improved to fix the situation.
What does it mean?
� There will be around 1Million AOS/I-485) applications by Aug 17 which will take 1M/140K = 7+ years to clear the backlog. Thus, late priority dates will remain retrogressed for several years.
� Some, who could not file AOS by 08/17, may have to wait for several years (5+ years).
� Longer EAD/AP renewals cycle and 1 year validity may have the following affects.
o You will have to stop working, if your EAD is not renewed in time.
o Several employers (and rightly so) may view EAD as a temporary permit and may be reluctant to hire you.
� You have to be in the same position with same job responsibilities for an indefinite time period, otherwise your GC application will be rejected.
� If you were unmarried at the time of filing and planning to bring spouse to the USA upon marriage, you will need to continue on current status (e.g. H-1B) or wait till your PD become current.
Immigration Voice (IV) Executive and Legislative Efforts
� Lobbying is an efficient tool to influence law and rule making.
� IV was very active in lobbying for CIR 2006, which was passed in Senate but failed in House.
� IV grass-root effort (flower campaign + San Jose Rally) was an important reason for retraction of July Visa Bulletin.
� Due to upcoming presidential elections, next congress session in October�07 may be our only window of opportunity for several years to influence the lawmakers.
Your options:
a) Struggle for several years.
b) Leave USA
c) Help yourself by joining IV.

Man. I laughed bcos u really made me laugh and I thank you for that.. especially after the recent omnibus fiasco...u know what I am saying..:D

any way .. my thinking is that since you have already gone thru other earlier stages and they check things at that shatte also so ..at yr 485 stage..you shud be good..so relax and njoy donot worry and also even if you worry...nothing is going to change so relax and make your family also relax as your tension will pass on to them as well...

Just njoy and be happy as I have realised being happy wards off many unwanted things which we never know might have come our way due to being depresssed...

;)

Thanks willigetagc and sayantan76 for your reply.

According to company lawyer i am preliminary discussing this issue with, she mentioned the EB1 can take 12-18 months at best, that why the concern that the foreign office might be close by then. I'm not from India/China, so there should be no priority date issue. How realistic do you guys think is it to get the whole process done in 90 days or so as mentioned sayantan76 ?

willigetagc, you mentioned about getting the EAD quickly. Once you got your EAD , does it mean that you will be still be on status even if the foreign office is closed by that time ?

H1B is probably the last option due to low probability of success and I would probably be out of status by that time.

Can you guys recommend some good immigration lawyer that you or your friends used that I can probably consult (I'm in the LA area) ? My email is ewana@gmail.com (in case it is now allowed in the forum or for privacy purposes). I'm the only employee on working visa on the company and it seems like the company lawyer is not very adept with immigration stuff.

Thanks a lot for all your help. greatly appreciate it.

You should probably check with atleast 2 lawyers. You can even have a phone conference (some charge roughly 100 bucks for a 30min conference) Try Murthy.com for one. Or open a new thread asking for attorney recommendations. That will be useful information for many people.

About EAD, I think once you get the EAD/AP, then you can use your EAD to reverify I-9. That would immediately invalidate your L1 but you will be in an AOS status. Keep a copy of the document for records. I don't know if your firm has to notify CIS, but probably not required. From then on you should use your AP when you travel out of the country. In fact, as soon as you get your AP, just make a trip out of the country and re-enter on the AP, go do an I-9 verification with your EAD and your L1 visa is history even in CIS books.
BTW, this is another thing you might want to check with the attorney.

It does'nt matter how long it takes to get the actual GC in your hand. Since, you are not from India/China, you can be out of this L1 loop within a couple of months after you file for your AOS+EAD+AP.

BTW, I don't know if they still accept premium processing on 140. IF they do, you are in great luck.

I was the first person in the QnA - disappointed at the intent of this meeting - they really care about illegal immigration - not once legal immigrants were discussed. It was a farce and IV was just used as an organization to show support to him - very disappointed.:mad:


gautamagg,
I was at the meeting and I was really taken aback by your question, it was totally out of context, I think I understand your position which is 'You wanted GC - you are not getting it - you decide to go back - but before that you decide to attend school - but cant get F1 coz you extablizhed Intent to Immigrate' -- This is a unique situation... atleast not something the larger IV community is affected by, but the accusing tone of your question to the Rep. was uncalled for .. I dont even know what you expected out of this meeting for your situation .. just try to get some perspective and place things incontext.. and again numbers matter.. if there were thousands of ppl in your situation your problem would have been addressed... anyways.. I beg to differ on your opinion about it being a farce.. There is effort being put to address the issues and IV has to maintain presence and make sure our issues are out there and are being noticed and not forgotten.. and thats what precisely happened yesterday.. IV members who are affected by Retrogression made their presence felt, the Core members were present on the dias rubbing shoulders with Congressman Gutierrez and representing the retrogressed community.
Your issue.. my friend .. unfortunately is not on the mandate of IV or the congressman..no doubt you were disappointed.. but good luck with you efforts and struggle.

Logicliffe i agree with you.

I think the Aim of IV should be to make the ENTIRE process of the GC quick and painless and abt 2.5 to 3 years start to finish.

Guys we have to fight the root cause and not the individual symptoms. United we stand. The problem is Backlogs at various stages. We should strive for removing the root cause of backlogs. A united voice which says, "Give us our Green Cards in abt 3 years". If we fight for each individual thing, we will be like many small streams each figthing for it's own little cause. So far we have seen the following SUB issues:

1) Spouses not being able to work
2) Children aging out
3) FBI/Name check clearance.

Now if we each start fighting for the specific cause, the movement will be scattered. Instead what we are trying to do is focuss on eliminating ALL problems.

Guys i ask everyone on here to step forward and Signup for the Rally we are trying to hold In DC. We need stronger numbers on that rally if we are to be successful.

To those guys:

Who are against Ms Murthy or any other law firms please educate yourselves before start whining. I am not going into more detail but I think Delax has fairly explained... Some entities may be working in the background for our cause and can not go public about their activities... You would say how do you know? For that you will have to learn the art of "Reading between the lines" .. And if you can not do that please shut your mouths. Everybody is playing their parts fairly.