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BREAKING IMMIGRATION NEWS
1/11/2022 Issue
PLAN “D” – REALLY?
     The White House, and the Democrats, failed in three attempts to convince the Parliamentarian of the Senate to approve their immigration plan for the Budget Reconciliation Bill. The White House and the Democratic Party understand that this puts them in a political bad shape. Because if they don’t accomplish anything for the millions of non-citizens in the U.S., after all their promises, what is the difference between them and the Republicans? Why vote for the Democrats – if they accomplish nothing?
            Therefore, suddenly, there are some new voices in the Senate, trying to find a way to “salvage” the Democrats immigration plan, after all.
            How? When? What?
            It’s too early to tell. Wait and see.
STAFF CHANGES IN THE WHITE HOUSE
 
           It has been published that some of the top immigration advisers of President Biden are about to leave their posts at the White House.
           In a way, that could be good news. A sports team that has been failing the first half of the season must replace the coach if it hopes to “salvage” the second half of the season. So, a change of top personnel of the political immigration team could, perhaps, save the second half of the political season.
 
FACEBOOK AND IMMIGRATION
 
           It seems that this giant American company, FACEBOOK, was extra-special nice to a certain group of immigrants.
           FACEBOOK, like many other tech companies, has a great number of employees who are non-citizens and working on all kinds of temporary working visas, probably H-1B visas. When the company liked any of these temporary workers, the company wanted to make them PERMANENT by sponsoring them for a Green Card through LABOR CERTIFICATION.
           This required FACEBOOK to advertise the positions, to test the labor market, and to prove to the U.S. Department of Labor that no qualified American workers are interested in these jobs at that salary.
           That was difficult because, apparently, there is no shortage of American computer workers who are willing to work for FACEBOOK. Their response to the ads killed the sponsorship for the non-citizen already employed by FACEBOOK.
           What did the company do? FACEBOOK has a regular recruitment process for all the many jobs they have to offer and fill at any time. But for the LABOR CERTIFICATION cases, they created a separate, different procedure.
           When this became known to the U.S. government, an investigation was started and the
conclusion was that the special, separate procedure actually DISCOURAGED American workers from applying for these positions.
After some litigation, FACEBOOK agreed to a SETTLEMENT without admitting to any guilt, liability or violation. The settlement cost FACEBOOK a little more than fourteen (14) million dollars in fines and compensation, and a consent for some time that Labor Certification recruitment by FACEBOOK would be subject to special supervision by the Department of Labor.
           FACEBOOK also agreed to withdraw all applications still pending at the time of this settlement.

COST OF U.S. PASSPORTS
           Hello, inflation - not only at the gas station and in the grocery store. Also at the Passport Office.
           The Department of State just revised the cost for U.S. passports (for American citizens, of course).
           The increase is of $20, so that a first-time U.S. passport will cost $165, and a renewal will cost $130.
SHORTAGE OF WORKERS

           NBC News published an item under the heading of “Slowing Immigration Worsens Job Shortages”. What they meant was not “shortage of jobs”, but “shortage of workers to fill the jobs”.
           They also provided interesting statistics:
           In 2016, the U.S. accepted 1,049,000 LEGAL immigrants. In 2021, the LEGAL immigrants entering the U.S. numbered only 247,000. In every year between 2016 and 2021, the number of LEGAL immigrants dropped by approximately 250,000 from the year before.
           In the five (5) years after 2016, 3 million LEGAL immigrants entered the U.S., instead of the 5 million that could have entered in normal times (before the Trump era).
           This is another reason for shortage of workers.
FOR IMMIGRATION QUESTIONS, CALL: (213)383-3222
3250 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 1918
Los Angeles, CA 90010
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