The Department of State will open the DV-2015 Diversity Visa (a.k.a. “green card”) lottery on Tuesday, October 1, 2014. The entries for this year’s lottery must be submitted electronically between noon, Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) (GMT-4), Wednesday, October 1, 2014, and noon, Eastern Standard Time (EST) (GMT-5), Monday, November 3, 2014. Applicants may access [...]
Many U.S. lawful permanent residents ("green card holders") who have to or choose to reside abroad are (or should be) aware that there are rules and restrictions on the time they can be outside of the U.S. and maintain their green card status. Specifically, a stay outside of the U.S. of more than one [...]
Mr. Charles Oppenheim, the Chief of the Visa Control and Reporting Division at the U.S. Department of State, just announced in a meeting in which our office participated that due to extraordinarily high volume of EB-2 India cases, the Department of State will make the EB-2 India category unavailable until the end of the fiscal [...]
Our office serves many first-time and returning reentry permit applicants and one of the most frequently asked questions or concerns related to the ability to extend a reentry permit after its initial term (of often two years) and about the validity of subsequent renewal reentry permit documents. The good news is that there is no [...]
The U.S. State Department has just released the October 2014 Visa Bulletin which is the first Visa Bulletin for the FY2015 fiscal year. The major headline in the upcoming month’s Visa Bulletin is the lack of movement in EB-2 and the expectation of an imminent retrogression in this category. EB-3 advances nicely for everyone except [...]
Effective September 12, 2014, the Department of State is changing the visa processing fees. Some of the fees will increase, while some will decrease. For example, the fees for K nonimmigrant visa applications will increase. On the other hand, most immigrant visa processing fees will decrease (some by a substantial amount). Nonimmigrant Visas The Department [...]
A recent article for Daily Signal entitled, "Deportation Mill?: Salvadoran Mom, Son Get Day in Remote Immigration Court?" provides an inside look at the case of an immigrant family in detention at Artesia, NM, which some call a "deportation mill". CILG's managing attorney Aleksandra Michailov was interviewed for the article and quoted throughout the article [...]
We are thrilled and honored to be chosen for the 2014 Global Mobility and Immigration Awards by Acquisition International and be named the Best for Corporate and Business Immigration in Washington DC. Firms included in the 2014 “Global Mobility and Immigration Awards” list are recognized for professional excellence with persistently impressive ratings from clients and [...]
The U.S. State Department has just released the September 2014 Visa Bulletin which is the twelfth and last Visa Bulletin for the FY2014 fiscal year. The major headline in the upcoming month’s Visa Bulletin is the continued notable forward movement in EB-2 India and EB-3 Philippines and the lack of movement in any of the [...]
This year's busy H-1B cap season included many H-1B employee candidates who hold F-1 status and who are employed in the U.S. pursuant to F-1 optional practical training (OPT) status. Out of these F-1 visa holders, many rely on the OPT cap-gap rule to continue working in the U.S. after the post-April 1st expiration date [...]