Estimated unused visa numbers since 1990 - 500,000!!
Immigrants are waiting in line to get their visas for over 7 years, and guess what, the USCIS is busy wasting visa numbers. According to lobbyist website politico.com,
Immigration is also on the community’s radar. Tech companies and others have been pushing legislation to allow the federal government to roll over unused green cards from year to year. The State Department estimates there are 500,000 unused green cards, dating back to 1990, said Robert Hoffman, co-chairman of Compete America, a coalition that lobbies for high-skilled immigration reform.
That’s not 50, not 500, but 500,000!! At present, a little over 700,000 I-485 (final stage of the green card process) applications are pending at the USCIS (a staggering figure and a problem by itself). If all these numbers were to be recaptured, that should eliminate a majority of that backlog.
The Oh Law Firm (one the best sources of Breaking News on immigration related issues) reported that over 80 businesses and University leaders wrote to the Senate and the House to act to recapture these visas.
The legislative bill was discussed today - 9/10.
The country needs effective management of visa numbers to ensure optimal labor workforce supply. But with reports such as this, God Bless America!
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September 11th, 2008 at 1:45 pm
The bill could not be discussed and was postponed to a “later date”. How typical!
September 18th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
This was supposed to be discussed on 9/17. Again postponed.
See Oh Law Firm’s account - “The visa recapture and nursing emergency relief bills mark-up hearing in the House Judiciary Committee today were marred by the apparent anti-immigration member of the Committee using a high level practical filiburster tactics blocking take-up of these immigration bills by bombarding amendments to another bill, H.R. 6020. The House’s targeted recess is September 26, 2008! Congratulations, FAIR?!?!”
We need stronger lobbyists to work with pro-immigration Senators to get ourselves heard. It appears that Anti-immigrant forces have a bigger say at present.
September 22nd, 2008 at 11:57 am
See http://www.immigration-law.com/ account on 9/20 -
As we noted earlier, the business/employment immigration commuinity indeed missed a golden opportunity to enact legislative-fix piecemeal employment-based immigration bills when the House Judiciary Committee failed to mark up these bills on September 17. In fact, even if the Committee had passed the bills, the chances for these bills to be enacted as legislations were not too promising because of the racing time before the sunset of this 110th Congress and a long road ahead to complete legislative process including the passage of the bills on the full House floor and passage of the bills in the Senate. For these reasons, the future of these bills as stand-alone bills is practically gone.
SAD!!!!
January 27th, 2009 at 11:52 am
I am waiting since 2002 for CG approval. In last 7 years,I have lost so many good opportunities to enhance career. Now with recession and layoffs, I have lost my job and waiting for my bank balance to turn zero..:-(
After all this waiting, now I have to go back to my home country and look for a job there..
I am very very demoralized..had so much faith American system.
November 23rd, 2009 at 7:12 am
I owe my success to having listened respectfully to the very best advice, and then going away and doing the exact opposite.