E-2 Treaty Investors Visa

The E-2 nonimmigrant classification allows a national of a treaty country (a country with which the United States maintains a treaty of commerce and navigation) to be admitted to the United States when investing a substantial amount of capital in a U.S. business. 

Certain employees and dependent family members of such a person or of a qualifying organization may also be eligible for this classification.

General Qualifications of a Treaty Investor:

To qualify for E-2 classification, the treaty investor must:

The L-1 intracompany transferee visa program

The L-1 visa program facilitates the temporary transfer of foreign nationals with management, professional, and specialist skills to the United States.

For purposes of section 101(a)(15)(L), an alien is considered to be serving in a capacity involving specialized knowledge with respect to a company if the alien has a special knowledge of the company product and its application in international markets or has an advanced level of knowledge of processes and procedures of the company.

Although the above definition is vague, there is more practical idea after the Puleo & Successive CIS memoranda:

Visa bulletin November 2013

November 2013 Visa bulletin has been released (valid from November 1 to November 30 only). Please see below for more details. 

Family Based:

Family-Sponsored	All Charge -ability Areas Except Those Listed	CHINA- mainland born	INDIA	MEXICO	PHILIPPINES
F1	22OCT06	22OCT06	22OCT06	22SEP93	01JUL01
F2A	08SEP13	08SEP13	08SEP13	01SEP13	08SEP13
F2B	22MAR06	22MAR06	22MAR06	01APR94	01MAR03
F3	08FEB03	08FEB03	08FEB03	01JUN93	08JAN93
F4	22AUG01	22AUG01	22AUG01	22OCT96	22APR90

Employment Based:

Employment-Based Quota Limit Reached for FY 2013

The State Department has confirmed to AILA liaison that employment annual limits have been reached, as is often the case at the end of a fiscal year.

USCIS will continue to process pending adjustment cases, and is able to submit visa number requests for all cases which are being finalized. The State Department will place requests in a “pending Demand” file.

Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Processing Recent Statistics

On June 15, 2012, President Obama signed a memo calling for deferred action for certain undocumented young people who came to the U.S. as children and have pursued education or military service here.  Applications under the program which is called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (“DACA”) begin on August 15, 2012.

When DACA went into effect last August it offered them a temporary reprieve from deportation, authorization to work and the ability to get a temporary social security card and drivers license.

2015 DV Lottery Opens on October 1, 2013

While Congress has been discussing changes to immigration policy through new immigration bills, President Obama has not yet signed any immigration bill into law.

Just last year, at least 8 million foreigners submitted a green card application through the green card lottery. Only 55,000 green card applications were able to obtain a green card for themselves, their spouses, and their children.

F2A is no longer current

As our firm predicted, F2A, the family based category for green cards was no longer current in October.

The F2A refers to the minor unmarried children and spouses of green card holders which was current from August 1 through September 30, 2013, but it will retrogress for October and probably for much longer after that.

Green Card Spouse and Children: F2A remains current

Green card holder’s spouse and children under 21 years old which called F2A category starting from August 1 remain current. Current means there is currently no line in this category and the green card holders can apply their spouse and children under 21 for green card.

However, it is likely to remain current only until November. This is because once enough applications have been accepted, then it is very likely to retrogress which means the line will come back as before. And once the line come back, the expectation for F2A is continuing to move forward slowly. How far it retrogress depends on how many applications are filed in the next few months. Therefore, there will be no surprise even if the line comes back in October.