EO H1b visas

Yesterday, President Trump issued an Executive Order impacting business immigration specifically, the H-1b visa. The order makes NO immediate changes to the H-1b program but, changes they are a coming. The EO essentially makes two (2) directives. First, it orders all agencies that touch the H-1b program to review all of its policies and regulations and write new policies and regulations to further protect US workers and prevent fraud and abuse in the H-1b program. Long-term, this may result in new proposed regulations which will be the subject of notice and comment. In the next few months, this may mean more policy memos, such as the memo released in late March which changed 20 years of policy and declared that many computer programmer positions would no longer be considered H-1b level occupations. As we saw with the introduction of the Neufeld policy memo in 2010, policy memos can have a major impact on a visa category. Immediately, I think we will see an increase in H-1b site visits; DOL LCA audits; 221(g) and administrative processing by US Consulates at visa stamping; RFE's; use of the NOID in place of the RFE; NOIR issuances; and, denials. The President is proclaiming that H-1b visas harm US workers and there is rampant fraud and abuse and by his comments and this EO, he is directing his administration to do everything in its power to right this wrong. If we thought the "culture of NO" which was pervasive during the last Administration was strong, we now expect to see the "culture of HELL NO" Secondly, the EO requests that the agencies involved devise a new scheme to replace the H-1b lottery and award the limited pool of H-1b visas to the "most-skilled or highest paid". The assumption being made in this EO is that [...]