Joe Biden wants Congress to act on immigration reform to speed up green cards for Indians
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US President Joe Biden wants Congress to follow up on immigration reform that would permit Indian doctors and different professionals to quickly get their green cards, as per his representative Jen Psaki.
“He thinks that there should be quick processing. That our immigration system is broken at numerous levels,” she said at a briefing on Wednesday. “He is anxious for Congress to push ahead with action there.”
She was replying to a question regarding a demonstration by Indian doctors in the US who had been in the frontlines of the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. Requesting the disposal of country amounts for green cards would enable them to get permanent residence status faster.
Asked about the delays in processing work authorization for spouses of those holding H1-B and L1 visas, Psaki said. “The reason we need to push for action on immigration (legislation) on the (Capitol) Hill is to push ahead. With expediting the processing and doing that on a few levels, including a number of the visas“. “However, that is essential for the reason behind why we think that’s such an important piece to move forward on.”
Indian doctors held a demonstration outside Congress last week demanding the removal of the country quotas to expedite their green cards.
A month ago, Democrats introduced a comprehensive immigration reform bill in Congress that would eliminate the country quotas for green cards. While spouses of residents are not restricted by the quotas. All other nations except Canada and Mexico are each allowed just 26,000 green cards every year. And this has made an enormous backlog for candidates from nations like India, while a few countries don’t utilize their full quota.
Immigration reform to speed up green cards for Indians
As indicated by the State Department, Indians with advanced degrees whose immigration applications were approved in 2009. And skilled workers and professionals whose applications were approved in 2010 are still waiting for their green cards. Those wait times are just for those whose applications are already approved. Also, it could run to centuries for those in the immigration queue.
The immigration reform bill faces an uphill battle because of the Republican’s request. That it includes severe restrictions on illegal immigration and the backing of some members of that party would be required in the Senate.
Prior, legislative action to remove country caps failed in the last Congress. Because the Senate and House of Representatives versions of the bill had differences that were not reconciled in time and it lapsed. The Senate in December 2020 and the House in 2019 had passed the different versions of the bill.
[FY 2022 H-1B Registration Period Closes; USCIS Expected to Conduct Selection Lotteries]
H-1B visas are for professionals and L-1 visas are for those moved by their organizations to the US. Their spouses had been permitted to work in the US under a regulations introduced by previous President Barack Obama. However, his successor Donald Trump had attempted to ban work authorization for them.
In its first week in office, the Biden government killed Trump’s effort and continued to make the spouses. Most Indian women, eligible to get work permits.
The San Jose Mercury reported last month that the Citizenship and Immigration Service had ascribed the work authorization. “Delays to ‘Covid-19 restrictions, an increase in filings, current postal service volume, and other external factors”. Moreover, the paper added that the agency said that it had redistributed workloads and staff were working additional hours to reduce the delays.
