In June, the Director of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency instructed his personnel to exercise broad \u201cprosecutorial discretion\u201d to allow people who are in the country illegally to remain here. Yesterday, Alejandro Mayorkas, Director of the U.S. Immigration and Citizenship Services (USCIS) agency, announced that his agency would exercise similar \u201cdiscretion\u201d to expand the number of visas allowing foreign nationals to gain permanent residence in the U.S.<\/p>\n
Under existing immigration law, USCIS has the discretion to issue National Interest Waivers (NIWs) to allow foreign guest workers to remain permanently in the United States, even if they do not have a job offer here, if their continued presence \u201cis in the national interest.\u201d The newly announced policy emphasizes that an \u201centrepreneur\u201d may act as an employer and petition for him\/herself as an employee.<\/p>\n
If you\u2019ve never heard of NIWs, you\u2019re not alone \u2013 but, no matter how obscure, if it exists you can count on the current administration to abuse it. The new liberal issuance of NIWs would apply to foreign nationals who can be classified as EB-2 workers. EB-2 is the classification for \u201cProfessionals with advanced degrees or exceptional ability.\u201d The existing standard for receiving an NIW requires that they be individuals of \u201csubstantial intrinsic merit\u201d and that the benefit of their work must be \u201cnational in scope.\u201d <\/p>\n
Under the initiative announced by USCIS, it appears that the standards for qualifying for an NIW will be relaxed and \u201cnational interest\u201d will be more loosely defined. A USCIS press release states vaguely that individuals may qualify for NIWs \u201cif they can demonstrate that their business endeavors will be in the interest of the United States.\u201d In the \u201cinterest of the United States\u201d is a substantially lower standard than possessing intrinsic abilities that makes one\u2019s work \u201cnational in scope,\u201d and seems to allow USCIS wide latitude to overestimate the value of people seeking NIWs. In other words, the current administration appears to be ignoring the law as it is written and implementing it as they wish it was written. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In June, the Director of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency instructed his personnel to exercise broad \u201cprosecutorial discretion\u201d to allow people who are in the country illegally to remain here. Yesterday, Alejandro Mayorkas, Director of the U.S. Immigration and Citizenship Services (USCIS) agency, announced that his agency would exercise similar \u201cdiscretion\u201d to expand<\/p>\n