I don’t know who Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-CA) is, but the quote that was attributed to him recently in the wake of the 40 or so members of the House of Representatives introducing bipartisan legislation that would allow thousands of undocumented farm workers with a path...
Year: 2019
The Trump Administration’s New “Public Charge” Rule
There’s been no shortage of things to write about over the past two-and-a-half years, either substantively or otherwise. The Trump Administration’s (or Stephen Miller’s) decision to change the “public charge” rule ranks up there as one of the most important things...
Immigration in the News
The other day, I saw the following headline on the NBC news site: Rep. Steve King: I drank from the toilet-fountain hybrid at border facility and it was ‘pretty good’. The article describes Rep. King’s recent visit to a migrant detention center where he explains that...
Back to School : Immigration and Education
As I write this article, we’re now into September, the end of summer is here, and my kids are heading back to school. One of my sisters-in-law is an elementary school teacher in the area, and invariably when we gather at family events, she tells me that her best and...
Enforcement Actions and Raids in the Age of Trump
As I write this article, the Saratoga thoroughbred racing season is just days away from its opening day. The trainers, veterinarians, farriers and jockeys can all be seen milling around the barns and training track. Downtown, the community is buzzing with visitors...
Not-for-Profits and the Importance of Immigration Advocates
Some of you know that I was engaged by the late Sr. Maureen Joyce, the then-CEO at Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Albany, in July 2000, to help Catholic Charities launch an immigration program that would serve low- and no-income individuals from a 14-county area...
Trump’s Immigration Agenda: Asylum
Now that the midterm elections have come and gone, and we’re fully two years into the Trump presidency, it seems like an appropriate time to take a look at various pieces of the President’s immigration “agenda”, if you can call it that. For far longer than I care to...
More H-2B Visas Allocated But Only For Returning Workers
My wife was listening to the news the other day about the border crisis (yes, it’s real, but certainly not in the way our President describes it) and suggested that I write about it. She’s right, I should write about it. And I will. But first, my New Years Eve debacle...
New Years Eve 2019 – The Epilogue (When the Broken Immigration System Broke)
Some of you will recall my post-New Years Eve rant about the H-2B nonimmigrant visa program, and specifically the mayhem that ensued as the clock struck midnight on New Years Eve when the U.S. Department of Labor’s (“USDOL”) servers had a meltdown.[1] As the New Year...
H-1B Visas in the Wake of “Buy American, Hire American”
My annual ritual. The start of the H-1B nonimmigrant visa filing season is once again upon us. And once again, immigration practitioners around the country are having increasingly more difficult conversations with their clients who wish to hire foreign nationals...