Immigration Agency Expertise

Woman With Back Pain[Blogger’s Note:  This post is submitted as a necessarily-lengthy formal comment to the November 20, 2015  draft guidance of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, PM-602-0122, interpreting the phrase, “the same or [a] similar occupational classification” as used in the “increased job flexibility” provisions of Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) §§ 204(j) and 212(a)(5)(A)(iv). This

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The usual xenophobic suspects made the usual noises after the tragic events in Boston last week.  Perhaps the most premature outcry came from electrified-border-fence proponent, Rep. Steve King, Republican from Iowa, who a day after the marathon explosions linked a report (ultimately untrue) that a Saudi national had planted the bombs with King’s mission

lawyer with section of law.jpg“U.S. immigration law is like stratified rock, revealing layer on layer of Congressional accretions laid down over many years, with the superstructure upended in tectonic shifts triggered by the baffling and contradictory interpretations of multiple agencies and courts.” 

Nothing of substance has changed since I offered that post last August, save for a groundbreaking election that

Wild rabbit in the meadow.jpgWinston Churchill, whose mother was American (Jennie Jerome of Brooklyn), could just as well have been speaking about the components of comprehensive immigration reform.  Instead he was commenting on the Allies’ post-World War II plans for world governance when, in the summer of 1942 with the war yet unwon, he said:

I hope these speculative studies

2 wild guys.jpgThe federal government regularly auctions airwaves and drilling leases.  Should it also auction humans?  This is the startling question posed recently at a May 15, 2012 Hamilton Project conference in a paper, a slide presentation and the transcript of remarks offered by Giovanni Peri, an economics professor at the University of California (Davis).

“How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?” ~ Satchel Paige

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One of the benefits of having played in the immigration sandbox for a long time is to see old friends return. A fondly remembered playmate — who left in 1995 and returned in 2010 — is a good ol’ cuss

shocking.jpg[Bloggers Note:  This post is authored jointly by Brandon Meyer and Angelo A. Paparelli] 

Some scandals raise eyebrows; others cause real economic harm.  The one we’re about to reveal — known as “tenant occupancy” — does both.  It makes the GSA’s Las Vegas cavorting pale in comparison. (Immigration lawyer alert:  For those with prurient interests [you know

grand canyon.jpgEver since I first sat in a Los Angeles movie theatre watching Grand Canyon, Lawrence Kasdan’s 1991 film, the only movie, to my knowledge, whose protagonist is an immigration lawyer, I knew I would mouth to myself, repeatedly over the ensuing years, one of its memorable lines.  The main character, Mac (played by Kevin Kline)

Who really wields power in Washington?  The December 3rd opening sketch of Saturday Night Live, featuring Fred Armisen as a chastened President Obama, offered an answer to the question. 

SNL‘s Obama shared his insight, gained over the last three years, that the presidency is not truly a powerful post, but merely a “ceremonial position . . .

Europe is at a tipping point.  Will the European Union be dashed on Greek or Italian shores.  Will France follow Greece and Italy in losing the esteem of bondholders? Will the EU revert to an Uncommon Market and again suffer its historic curse, a mash-up of competing and warring states whose citizens must proffer passports to