Dive Temporary:
- The U.S. Division of Homeland Safety issued a last rule Wednesday updating H-1B visa eligibility necessities and different modifications it mentioned would give employers better flexibility in using expert overseas employees.
- DHS’ rule follows up on a 2023 proposed rule that sought to “modernize” the H-1B program. Particularly, Wednesday’s rule revises the definition of “specialty occupation” to make clear that whereas sponsoring employers might settle for a spread of qualifying diploma fields when contemplating candidates for such occupations, the fields should be instantly associated to a job’s duties in an effort to meet the specialty occupation requirement.
- Different modifications embody up to date definitions for the nonprofit and governmental analysis group classes, by way of which DHS would broaden visa cap exemption eligibility for some petitions in these classes. One other set of updates clarifies necessities for visa petitioners. The rule is about to take impact Jan. 17, 2025.
Dive Perception:
Employers ought to put together for some potential disruption brought on by the brand new rule, attorneys with regulation agency Fragomen mentioned in a Jan. 17 weblog. The agency mentioned the rule would require use of a brand new Kind I-129 and that adjudicators for the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Companies “might take a while to turn into conversant in the brand new authorized requirements.”
It’s one among many immigration-related changes employers may must make forward over the following few months. The upcoming inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump has brought about some employment regulation consultants to warn of the potential for worksite investigations, in addition to auditing of employers’ Kind I-9 compliance practices.
In a press launch Tuesday, DHS mentioned its newest rule aimed to enhance effectivity in addition to flexibility within the H-1B program.
“The H-1B program was created by Congress in 1990, and there’s no query it wanted to be modernized to assist our nation’s rising economic system,” Ur Jaddou, director of USCIS, mentioned within the launch. “The modifications made in at present’s last rule will be certain that U.S. employers can rent the extremely expert employees they should develop and innovate whereas enhancing the integrity of this system.”
The H1-B program is essential to high schools, which regularly use it as an avenue to rent overseas college members. In the meantime, it permits a few of their worldwide college students to work within the U.S. after they graduate from their packages.
Final yr’s H-1B proposed rule additionally contained provisions round stopping fraud that DHS addressed individually in a last rule revealed final January. That rule amended the company’s course of for choosing H-1B visa program registrants, implementing a “beneficiary centric” course of that selects petitions by distinctive beneficiary reasonably than by registration.