USA Green Card Immigration Blog

The annual American “Green Card Lottery” or “Immigration Lottery” is set to begin on October 4, 2011 and will run through November 5, 2011.  For detailed information about this year’s revised eligibility requirements and entry instructions, you can visit the USA Green Card web site at http://www.usa-green-card.com

Obama pushes back on immigration policy criticism from Latinos – 44 – The Washington Post.

The Kentucky Consular Center in Williamsburg, Kentucky has registered and notified the winners of the DV-2012 Diversity Visa Program. The program was conducted under the terms of section 203(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act and makes available *50,000 permanent resident visas annually to persons from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States. Approximately 100,000 applicants have been registered and notified and may now make an application for an immigrant visa. Since it is likely that some of the first *50,000 persons registered will not pursue their cases to visa issuance, this larger figure should insure that all DV-2012 numbers will be used during fiscal year 2012 (October 1, 2011 until September 30, 2012).

Applicants registered for the DV-2012 program were selected at random from the approximately 14.8 million qualified entries received. The visas have been apportioned among six geographic regions with a maximum of seven percent available to persons born in any single country. During the visa interview, principal applicants must provide proof of a high school education or its equivalent, or show two years of work experience in an occupation that requires at least two years of training or experience within the past five years. Those selected will need to act on their immigrant visa applications quickly. Applicants should follow the instructions in their notification letter and must fully complete the information requested.

Registrants living legally in the United States who wish to apply for adjustment of their status must contact U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services for information on the requirements and procedures. Once the total *50,000 visa numbers have been used, the program for fiscal year 2012 will end. Selected applicants who do not receive visas by September 30, 2012 will derive no further benefit from their DV-2012 registration. Similarly, spouses and children accompanying or following to join DV-2012 principal applicants are only entitled to derivative diversity visa status until September 30, 2012.

Only participants in the DV-2012 program who were selected for further processing have been notified. Those who have not received notification were not selected. They may submit an application for the upcoming DV-2013 lottery.

*The Nicaraguan and Central American Relief Act (NCARA) passed by Congress in November 1997 stipulated that up to 5,000 of the 55,000 annually-allocated diversity visas be made available for use under the NCARA program. The reduction of the limit of available visas to 50,000 began with DV-2000.

Obama: Immigration reform requires changing the law | Fox News Latino.

Washington –  President Barack Obama said that while he can lessen some of the injustices in the current U.S. immigration system, real progress requires changing the law.

His obligation as president is to enforce the existing law, Obama said in a White House roundtable with correspondents from Efe and other Spanish-language media outlets.

Recent changes in deportation policy that prioritize expelling undocumented immigrants who committed crimes are not sufficient, according to the president, who said the problem cannot be resolved through “administrative” measures.

Amending the policy on deportations will not achieve the path to citizenship for undocumented migrants “that I believe must be part of the solution,” he told the journalists.

Obama said his administration will continue to press for comprehensive immigration reform, one of his 2008 campaign promises.

His failure so far to deliver on that promise is one of the factors that have sparked a drastic drop in support for the Democratic president among Hispanic voters, which according to the latest surveys stands at 48 percent, compared with 67 percent in 2008.

The president, however, told the media roundtable that Latino voters will not punish him in 2012 for his not being able to persuade Republicans in Congress to do the right thing on immigration.

Turning to the economy, Obama said the jobs bill he sent to Congress on Monday will have an “enormous impact” on the Hispanic community.

Part of the program, $15 billion, will go to investment in infrastructure, something that will benefit Latino workers with their strong presence in construction.

And the more than 1 million Hispanics without jobs could see their unemployment benefits prolonged, the president said.

Obama believes that the measure has the right mix of tax cuts and investment to provide an immediate stimulus to the economy, in which joblessness is around 9.1 percent.

One of the groups hit hardest by the recession are young Hispanics, with an unemployment rate of 19.3 percent.

To try and reduce that percentage, the White House will help the states create summer job programs for low-income Latino youths in 2012.

The president also discussed a demand from Congress that his administration hand over all records relating to the possible involvement of three former and current White House staff members with the botched “Fast and Furious” gun-trafficking sting.

The White House Office of Legal Counsel is reviewing the congressional request, Obama said.

He said he did not learn about Fast and Furious until the operation went badly wrong and that White House officials were told only that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was planning an operation aimed at reducing the smuggling of guns to Mexico, where more than 40,000 have died in drug-related violence.

The controversial 2009-2010 undercover operation saw ATF agents allow some 2,000 weapons purchased by straw buyers at U.S. gun shops to be smuggled into Mexico.

The idea was to trace them to powerful drug traffickers in Mexico, but once Fast and Furious got underway ATF agents realized they had no dependable way to keep track of the guns, which eventually began appearing at crime scenes on both sides of the border.

The operation has caused tension between the United States and Mexico and is the object of separate investigations by the Justice Department and Congress.

Obama said that the operation does not represent the policy of the administration and stressed his interest in collaborating as closely as possible with Mexico to deal with the scourge of drug trafficking.

House Committee to Take Up E-Verify Bill | immigration-news.

The House Judiciary Committee is set to debate the Legal Workforce Act, a bill proposing all U.S. businesses be required to use the federal E-Verify system to ensure only citizens or immigrants who have a work visa are employed in the United States.

Committee chairman Lamar Smith, a Republican from Texas and who is the bill’s sponsor, is a member of the House’s Reclaim American Jobs Caucus. The caucus’ stated mission is to draw attention to the link between illegal immigration and unemployment, and on its web page cites a statistic that an estimated 8 million illegal immigrants are in the current U.S. workforce, while 15 million American citizens are unemployed. The group describes E-Verify as a key measure to ensure illegal immigrants do not take jobs from citizens.

The bill’s opponents, including President Barack Obama, argue that the E-Verify system is unreliable and that mandated participation would make large-scale immigration reform, including a path to citizenship for undocumented workers already integrated into the country’s social and economic fabric, more difficult to institute.

“If your answer is to enforce a dysfunctional system, you’re going to have problems,” Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California, a Democrat on the judiciary committee, told the Washington Times.

Some states and municipalities have already passed E-Verify laws. San Bernardino County, California, is considering an ordinance requiring all food industry employers to use the database, while the state’s farmers have said mandated use of E-Verify would cripple the agriculture sector’s workforce.

2011 Green Card Lottery (“DV-2013″ Program):  Dates announced for this year’s Diversity Visa Lottery.

The green card lottery will run from October 4, 2011 through November 5, 2011.  You can register now through the USA Green Card web site (www.usa-green-card.com) to avoid last-minute problems and surprises.

Complete requirements and the application form are available now!  Contact us with any questions:  lottery@usa-green-card.com

Nation-World | Immigration reform stalls in Congress | The Detroit News.

Worries over ease of terrorists’ entry into U.S. means legislation remains elusive

Marisa Schultz/ The Detroit News

The week before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, President George W. Bush welcomed Mexican President Vicente Fox to the White House for his first state dinner of upscale Tex-Mex.

Fox proclaimed the two countries could reach an immigration agreement by year’s end. And Bush, bucking some in his Republican Party, entertained ideas of granting legal status for some Mexican immigrants.

The news of high-level immigration talks thrilled Veronica T. Thronson, who worked in New York for an immigrant advocacy group. Their midtown office was abuzz with excitement that reform was finally going to happen in 2001. They pushed out press releases heralding the progress.

“Then Sept. 11 happened,” said Thronson, who now heads Michigan State University College of Law’s Immigration Law Clinic. “We knew that immigrants were going to be blamed somehow. That day it happened.”

Shortly after it was discovered that 9/11 hijackers entered the country with legally issued visas, the conversation around immigration became inextricably linked with terrorism. The anti-foreigner movement that took shape and the preoccupation with protecting the United States effectively knocked immigration reform off the national agenda. Ten years later, comprehensive legislation to alter how and when foreigners can become citizens has remained elusive.

Even a small part of immigration reform, known as the DREAM Act, has failed to pass Congress every time it’s been introduced in the past decade. It would allow undocumented students a pathway to citizenship through two years of college or military service.

After the initial horror of the terrorist attacks dissipated, the country was rocked by a prolonged recession in which millions of legal citizens were jobless. The downturn coincided with the spread of immigrant populations.

Historically, immigrants primarily settled in six states, including New York, California and Texas, said Ann Chih Lin, associate professor of public policy at the University of Michigan. But during the boom years of the 1990s, big influxes spread to states throughout the country. That set the stage for difficulties as some Americans became preoccupied with security, feared outsiders and had a grassroots anti-immigrant sentiment, Lin said.

“You can overlook a lot of foreigners when the economy is going well,” Lin said. “The bad economy stranded them in places that didn’t have the infrastructure to help resolve some of these problems.”

Assisting illegal immigrants hasn’t been a political priority in Washington, and the focus instead has been on border security, deportations and ensuring people don’t come to the United States to do harm. Though he supports the DREAM Act and immigration reform, President Barack Obama has ramped up deportations and deployed more security personnel to the southern border than ever before.

David Koelsch, professor at the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law, views the shift in attitude since 9/11 as a “net positive.” Prior to the attacks, immigration was a “sleeping giant” with laws not being enforced and people not associating the influx of foreigners with security.

Afterward, the Department of Homeland Security was set up. There’s better coordination among federal agencies, and local authorities are working with federal agencies to facilitate deportations following jail sentences, said Koelsch, who directs the Immigration Law Clinic at the college.

Lin and Thronson believe major immigration reform would have had a good chance of passing during the Bush administration had it not been for 9/11. Koelsch believes that’s an oversimplification. All three want comprehensive immigration reform, but their visions for solutions vary.

Meantime, the inability of Congress to pass an immigration package has spurred state and local politicians to pass their own laws, such as Arizona’s legislation giving police broad powers to detain those suspected of being undocumented, as well as legislation in New Mexico and elsewhere to allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses.

Even in Michigan — with among the lowest percentages of undocumented residents, according to the Pew Hispanic Center — a package of bills is pending in the Legislature that would crack down on undocumented immigrants who live and work here. One bill is similar to Arizona’s divisive law.

As Thronson supervises her students, she looks back a decade ago to the progress in the making. “We were so close,” she said. “We were so close.”

Immigration Agency Denies Gay Couple’s Petition | immigration-news.

Tue, Aug 9 5:24 PM

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services recently denied permanent residency to an Australian man, Anthony Makk, whose same-sex spouse, Bradford Wells, is a U.S. citizen.

Makk and Wells have lived together for nearly two decades and were married seven years ago in Massachusetts. However, the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act denies immigration benefits to same-sex couples. USCIS cited this law in rendering a decision against Makk’s application for an I-130 visa, which would grant him permanent residency as the spouse of a U.S. national. Unless the decision is reversed, Makk must leave the country by August 25.

Wells told the San Francisco Chronicle that as an AIDS patient, he relies on extensive medical insurance and essential care he receives in this country, making a move to Australia with Makk impossible.

Earlier this year, the White House declared it will no longer defend DOMA in court, though the U.S. Justice Department would continue to enforce the law.

A spokeman for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat from California, told The Chronicle the congresswoman will work to overturn the USCIS ruling.

Last March, same-sex couples cheered when USCIS announced a suspension of deportation cases involving gay citizens with immigrant spouses. However, shortly after its announcement, USCIS clarified the suspension would only last a few weeks, until a specific legal matter was settled.

Internet Scam Offers Visas for $900 | immigration-news.

Fri, Sep 2 1:03 PM

An internet scam is victimizing people who want to obtain a U.S. visa, NBC Miami recently reported.

According to the source, thousands of visa applicants have received an email telling them they have won a U.S. Department of State lottery and will be provided a visa – as soon as they wire $900 through Western Union.

Carmen Pino, a worker with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, told NBC Miami the email is a fraud, and might indicate the computer system tracking visa applications has been compromised by a hacker.

One recipient of the email, Venezualan Hely Santilez, told the source that the email asked for details of his family, and for money. He said he was suspicious of the message and did not send money because in his past travels to the United States, he always paid the U.S. Embassy directly for his visas.

The Department of State reports there were 3,564 cases of visa and passport fraud reported in 2005. Penalties for visa fraud range from 10 years imprisonment for a first offense to 25 years, if the fraud was related to international terrorism.