Effective today, January 17, 2017, a new USCIS rule seeks to improve multiple employment-based temporary nonimmigrant and immigrant visa (“green card”) programs. The new regulations are designed to help U.S. employers hire and retain high-skilled foreign workers who are waiting to become lawful permanent residents, and to help those foreign workers continue to advance professionally even as wait times for employment-based green cards grow ever longer. The final rule clarifies and builds upon numerous longstanding USCIS policies adopted since the enactment of the American Competitiveness in the Twenty-First Century Act (AC21) in 2000 and the American Competitiveness and Workforce Improvement Act (ACWIA) in 1998.
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