US President Joe Biden believes that it will be significant and lengthy overdue to modernise the immigration system, and this consists of taking steps to assist guarantee extremely expert staff can keep within the nation, the White House has mentioned.
Biden has revoked a coverage issued by his predecessor throughout the COVID-19 pandemic that blocked many Green Card candidates from coming into the US, a transfer that can profit many Indians working in America on the H-1B visa.
A Green Card, recognized formally as a Permanent Resident Card, is a doc issued to immigrants to the US as proof that the bearer has been granted the privilege of residing completely. “The president believes that it’s important and long overdue to modernise our immigration system, and that includes taking steps to help ensure that high skilled workers can stay in the country and can go through the proper processes to stay in the country,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki instructed reporters at her every day information convention on Thursday.
“So, we are eager to work with Democrats and Republicans in Congress to get that done,” she mentioned a day after Biden issued the proclamation reversing the choice of his predecessor Donald Trump. Indian IT professionals, most of whom are extremely expert and are available to the US primarily on the H-1B work visas, are the worst victims of the present immigration system which imposes a seven per cent per nation quota on allotment of the coveted Green Card or everlasting authorized residency.
The H-1B visa, essentially the most wanted amongst Indian IT professionals, is a non-immigrant visa that enables US firms to make use of international staff in speciality occupations that require theoretical or technical experience.
Technology firms rely on it to rent tens of 1000’s of workers every year from international locations like India and China. Reopening the nation to folks looking for inexperienced playing cards, or authorized everlasting residence, Biden in his proclamation on Wednesday mentioned that the coverage of former president Trump doesn’t advance the pursuits of the United States.
“To the contrary, it harms the United States, including by preventing certain family members of United States citizens and lawful permanent residents from joining their families here,” he mentioned.
“It also harms industries in the United States that utilise talent from around the world. And it harms individuals who were selected to receive the opportunity to apply for, and those who have likewise received, immigrant visas through the Fiscal Year 2020 Diversity Visa Lottery,” Biden, a Democrat, mentioned.
Trump, a Republican, issued the ban final 12 months, saying it was wanted to guard US staff amid excessive unemployment because of the coronavirus pandemic. The US is at present dealing with a backlog of practically 473,000 certified family-based Green Card requests. As a results of Trump’s ban on issuing inexperienced playing cards, as many as 120,000 family-based choice visas had been misplaced. But this got here as an enormous boon for issuing employment-based inexperienced playing cards, primarily these on H-1B visas. Thousands of Indian IT professionals who painstakingly waited for his or her Green Card acquired their authorized everlasting residency consequently in the previous few months of the Trump administration.
To a query on youngsters reaching the US-Mexico border and not using a mum or dad, the White House press secretary mentioned that “having unaccompanied minors travel across the border and so many, that we are looking… we had to open new facilities, (this) is something that we take incredibly seriously and we, you know, are eager to, of course, address humanely and with a focus of keeping them safe”.
“I don’t think I’m going to put new labels on it from here or from the podium. But it is a priority of the administration. It’s a priority of our secretary of Homeland Security and certainly of the president, who’s kept abreast of the developments,” Psaki mentioned.
The Department of Homeland Security has put in place interim enforcement priorities and is reviewing the prior administration’s insurance policies and practices, she mentioned. “The court’s ruling still allows us to do this. In terms of the next steps, or how we will approach it from here, I would send you to our Department of Justice,” Psaki mentioned.
She mentioned that “we don’t feel that sending unaccompanied minors, kids, back to take a dangerous journey is the right step to take”. This will not be one thing that the administration goes to do and it’ll not be its coverage, Psaki mentioned. “But we always need to keep communicating more effectively about how this is a dangerous time to travel, this is a dangerous time for families to come, for children to come, and we’ll continue to work to do that more,” she mentioned in response to a query.
