H-IB Facts and Findings
On July 20, 2010 American Immigration Council’s Legal Action Center filed a lawsuit at the U.S. District Court for District of Columbia against the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and against the Department of Homeland Security ( DHS) on behalf of AILA, the American Immigration Lawyers Association. This was a result of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests that had been denied.
Since 2008 USCIS has increased unannounced visits to worksites for inspection as well as imposed secret guidelines for review and processing. According to Crystal Williams, the Executive Director of AILA “requested documents are the kind that a government agency should release as a matter of course.” The DHS visits for 2010 alone are expected to reach 25,000.
USCIS has recently submitted its 2009 report to Congress and some key points include:
- H-IB petitions approved decreased from 22% from 2008
- H-IB petitions filed decreased 15% from 2008 to 2009
- 48% of all H-IB’s approved were in 2009 were for workers born in India
- Median salary of H-IB beneficiaries of approved petitions increased from $60,000 to $64,000 from 2008 to 2009
- 41% of approved H-IB beneficiaries had a bachelor’s degree; 40% a Master’s; 13% a doctorate and 6% professional degree
This annual report is available at http://www.uscis.gov/USCIS/Resources/Reports%20and20Studies/H-IB/hlb-fy-09-characteristics.pdf
Sources
American Immigration Council Legal Action Center
AILA