With H-1B in limbo, Congressional backers push Green Card fix

[OhioChick]

Source: Computer World

Head of key House committee has introduced three bills in two months

May 14, 2008 (Computerworld) Efforts to increase the H-1B cap have been stuck in a legislative swamp, but U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) has introduced three bills in the last few weeks to help foreign nationals already working in the U.S. to obtain permanent residency. She announced her latest legislative effort late Wednesday.

Fixing the permanent residency, or green card employment-based, visa program has been a top legislative goal of high-tech industry proponents, on par with their efforts to raise the H-1B cap.

And Lofgren, who heads the U.S. House Subcommittee on Immigration, is in the position to move legislation to the head of the class. But it remains to be seen whether she can jump over the legislative stalemate created by lawmakers who want comprehensive immigration reform or nothing at all.

Lofgren's latest bill, HR 6039, which is not yet available online, will exempt graduates of U.S. universities with advanced degrees in science and tech -- the so called STEM degrees (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) -- from the annual 140,000 limit on these permanent residency visas. The bill was officially introduced yesterday.



Read more: http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9085658&intsrc=hm_list

[DJ13]

1. Unemployment going up? Lets hire more foreign workers, great idea!

Our laws dealing with Treason need to be revamped.

[ChromeFoundry]

2. I wonder if the US did not allow dual citizenships...

if that would change anything. Just curious.

[OhioChick]

11. Hmmmm.......

Now you have me wondering.

[AzDar]

3. No.

[barnel]

4. Lofgren SUCKS

she's always got h-1bs up her sleave

with democrats like her, they dont even need the republican party

[OhioChick]

5. I'll have to do some writing again....

And send this gem to Grassley and Durbin, as well as a few others.

[babylonsister]

6. Any idea why Lofgren is pushing this so hard? nt

[OhioChick]

7. Not sure but did a quick search and found these:

"Usually supports higher immigration, population growth, foreign labor."

http://profiles.numbersusa.com/improfile.php3?DistSend=CA&VIPID=75

Rep. Zoe Lofgren is introducing a bill that will hand out thousands
of green cards for foreigners who want to take jobs in the U.S. Lofgren's
bill purports to "recapture" visas that weren't issued between 1992-2007,
and it will allow visas to be recaptured in the future.

Lofgren's bill joins three other ones in the House to raise H-1B and two in
the Senate.

There isn't much information on the bill because the text hasn't been
formally introduced yet:

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-5882

H.R. 5882: To recapture employment-based immigrant visas lost to
bureaucratic delays and to...
To recapture employment-based immigrant visas lost to bureaucratic delays
and to prevent losses of family- and employment-based immigrant visas in
the future.

Sponsor: Rep. Zoe Lofgren
Cosponsors Rep. James Sensenbrenner


It seems that there is one group that has the inside scoop on the bill --
ImmigrationVoice. That group of radical H-1B lobbyists got an unofficial
version and put it online. They have been lobbying for recapture for a long
time, and it looks like they scored big time with Lofgren.

You can see the unofficial version of the bill here (keep in mind it might
change). ImmigrationVoice stamped their name on the document just to let us
know that they own it.

http://immigrationvoice.org/media/LOFGRE_076_xml.pdf

This DHS web page has some statistics on just how many visas Lofgren
intends on handing out:

http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/cisomb_annualrpt07__June_11_2007_section3
e_untimelyprocessing.pdf

Employment Based Visas: 218,759
Family members who want to tag along: 200,928
Total Visas (not including 2007-2008): 419,687

Many of those family members will all get jobs too, so Lofgren's bill will
dump a huge new workforce into the U.S.

The DHS document has some other very interesting information.

some have predicted that within a few months as many as
500,000 to 750,000 individuals now residing in the United
States under a temporary worker visa could apply for a
green card.

So, three quarters of a million temporary guest workers that are probably
mostly H-1B and L-1 visa holders, and perhaps STEM students on OPT are
waiting in line for green cards. Approximately 60,000 visas will be given
to nurses, so it's not just techies who will be affected. If Lofgren has
her way, we will give them all green cards so that they can permanently
displace us from our jobs.

IN CONCLUSION: I suspect that Lofgren is offering this bill in tandem with
the Cornyn bill in the Senate. Both bills have recapture provisions,
although Cornyn's bill is far worse because it also has massive increases
in H-1B visas.

More: http://www.eng-i.com/E-News1859.htm

[barnel]

8. because silicon vally is her district

she is literally an employee of silicon vally

that and nothing else

[OhioChick]

9. Oh.....I See..... n/t

[Name removed]

10. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[nebula]

12. What's in it for Lofgren?

suitcases full of cash compliments of her Indian 'donors.'

[crimsonblue]

13. as a STEM college student...

FUCK you Lofgren. You are fucking over American students with this bill. We need to be focusing on educating our own people before we start using taxpayer dollars to educate foreigners. How can we solve outsourcing when even education is outsourced to foreign students?

[OhioChick]

14. Well Said. n/t