Category: Employment

Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff and Attorney General Michael Mukasey announced on February 22, 2008, that the fines for hiring undocumented workers will increase and that the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice are also working “to increase criminal prosecutions against the most egregious employer offenders.” The increased fines are expected to take effect… Read More

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and the Department of Labor both issued proposed rules in February 2008 affecting the H-2A nonimmigrant visa program, which allows U.S. employers to bring foreign nationals to the U.S. for temporary or seasonal agricultural work. USCIS said its proposed rule is designed to “remove unnecessary limitations on H-2A employers… Read More

The Department of Homeland Security is now converting funds from checks into electronic funds transfers for the Application for Employment Authorization (Form I-765). Checks should be made payable to “U.S. Department of Homeland Security.” The DHS notes in the instructions to the form that “[y]ou will not receive your original check back. We will destroy… Read More

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services faces a large backlog of immigration cases because of fee changes that led to a rush in applications filed in advance of the increases, combined with confusion over the cut-off date for employment-based change or adjustment of status applications. The latter confusion, the Daily Labor Report noted, was caused by… Read More

Will the European Union (EU) and other countries’ aggressive recruitment strategies leave the U.S. behind in the dust? Robert Hoffman of Oracle warned that could be the case if the U.S. continues down its current discouraging path. With the proposed EU “blue card” for highly skilled workers looming on the horizon, Mr. Hoffman noted in… Read More