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My colleges (Danielle Atchison & Leyla McMullen) and I are in San Francisco at the AILA Annual National Conference, and we’ve had another full day of sharpening skills, learning from the experience of other attorneys around the country, and finding ways to better serve our clients.
We have participated in a variety of sessions relating to business immigration, but there have been some common focuses and takeaways throughout:
The landscape of U.S. immigration is NOTHING like it was, even twelve months ago.
What has worked for the last 10-15 years is NOT likely to produce the same results today.
What Employers Should Know:
There is still hope, but this process is not for the faint of heart, and employers need to know up front that nearly any petition is going to be an uphill battle. Be prepared for the following:
Long wait for nearly every step of the process,
We’re hearing from other practitioners and even government representatives about severe delays all across the board.
Even the best prepared petitions will LIKELY still get a request for additional evidence.
EVERY session here is discussing an extreme increase in Requests for Evidence (RFE) from by USCIS who is aggressively issuing these requests where one would have never occurred only months ago.
Your business immigration attorneys WILL annoy you with seemingly sporadic, unrelated questions.
You may not see the reason behind some of the questions or requests made by your attorney. TRUST them, they’re trying to win and save you time in the long run.
Your potential employee beneficiaries will likely become confused, impatient, and even angry by the process.
Increasingly, attorneys are reporting that the intended beneficiaries are baffled about the process. This is more than understandable, and every effort should be made to keep them informed and to let them know that everything possible in their case is being done.
This conference is a wonderful resource, and we will be posting additional takeaways throughout.
Mason Ellis Business Immigration Attorney MDIVANI CORPORATE IMMIGRATION LAW FIRM
Phone :: 913.317.6200 Email :: MEllis@uslegalimmigration.com
