Family reunification, at least as far back as the Quota Law of 1921, has been and remains today a cornerstone of America’s immigration laws. Yet, one growing segment of family immigration is disfavored by operation of law. These are the families of same-sex life partners who must live under a legal system that imposes family-separation
May 2009
“All along the [Immigration] Watchtower”
On the heels of my May 8 post (Do Immigration Fee Revenues Drive Justice at the USCIS?), the Office of the Ombudsman to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) issued a May 15 report criticizing the unfairness and inconsistency across USCIS offices nationwide of the agency’s procedures for getting a seasoned officer to…
A Silent Bronx Cheer: Hillary to “Streamline the Visa Process”
There was no one in the bleachers at the new Yankee Stadium to offer a Bronx cheer to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on May 13 when she promised to “streamline the visa process” during her commencement address to New York University students:
[W]e should bring more qualified students from other countries to study here.
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Do Immigration Fee Revenues Drive Justice at the USCIS?
Immigration lawyers, including this blogger, have attended liaison meetings with the USCIS California Service Center and its predecessor agency, INS, for decades. These meetings have been periodically convened (typically on at least a quarterly basis) since the agency was first housed, decades ago, in San Ysidro CA just inside the U.S. border with Tijuana (the…
Immigration’s “Animal Spirits”
The dismal state of the economy has caused economists to revive the Keynesian notion of “animal spirits,” the concept that the economy is not merely understood through the study of charts, metrics and data, but also from psychological factors that move people to invest, build, lend, buy and sell. A new book by economists George…