RENEGING REFORM - Have President Obama's immigration reform promises faded from mind? - By Martin Desmarais

A year ago spirits in the immigration law industry were flying high as many anticipated newly elected President Barack Obama would deliver on his campaign promise of comprehensive immigration reform. However, that optimism has swung deeply south as many now feel comprehensive immigration reform is as far off as it has ever been.

“Obama made a lot of promises to a lot of different groups, but the reality on the ground is bit different,” said Charles H. Kuck, managing partner of the Atlanta-based immigration law firm Kuck Casablanca LLC and immediate past president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “He should be pushing immigration reform along … regardless of the economy, regardless if his health care passes.”

Kuck does not doubt President Obama’s interest in immigration reform. However, he is not satisfied with the tactic of relying on Congress to put forth legislation on the matter. Kuck believes that, due to the hot button nature of immigration reform, this is not something that America’s legislators have an interest in doing. He stressed that President Obama needs to put Congress’ “feet to the fire” or they will not act.

And now, with elections looming for legislators, Kuck does not anticipate any movement on comprehensive immigration reform. “On the ground the feeling is the chance of immigration reform are slim,” he said.

According to him, the immigration situation has reverted back to what it was when former President George H.W. Bush was in office, which is disheartening sentiment for many of the immigration reform supporters who welcomed the onset of President Obama administration.

“It puts us in an immigration malaise,” Kuck said. “It puts us trying to protect the same laws we have been trying to protect for 20 years.”

Kuck believes that some immigration reform may come piecemeal piggybacked on other legislation, but he has put his hopes of comprehensive immigration reform aside for the moment.

He also pointed out that Obama’s administration has actually been tougher on immigration than Bush’s ever was, with aggressive audits of immigration workers and a recent memo from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which has made it even harder to obtain H1-B visas due to the bureau’s new stricter interpretation of H1-B definitions.

Kuck

“The practice of immigration law has become that much harder,” Kuck said. “Sure clients are turning to us but we have less and less of the answers … It is just that much more difficult to obtain the status they want.

“Right now is a difficult time. Usually there is a rush to get H1-Bs, but there is no rush right now. There are no H1-Bs,” he added. “They are not going to hit the cap for many years.”

Sheela Murthy, head of Owing Mills, Md.-based, immigration-focused, Murthy Law Firm, had less optimism than most about the reality of immigration reform happening in 2009, so she is less surprised that the tide seemed to have turned, but this does not make things any easier to swallow from her perspective.

“I think it has been shoveled aside because there are bigger problems [such as health care, war and the economy],” Murthy said. “It is frustrating because you keep hoping something will happen for people who have spent their life working [on immigration].

Regardless, she stressed that immigration reform cannot be continually swept under the rug. “There are no simple solutions for any of this, but it all makes perfect sense that we need to do something about this. There is a problem,” she said. “There seems to be a huge systematic overhaul problem that we are dealing with.”

Like Kuck, Murthy sees an impact on the way her immigration law firm does business.

“Yes, the climate has changed. Things have become more difficult,” she said.

Murthy is particularly dissatisfied about the USCIS memo that has made it harder to get H1-Bs and she feels that the bureau has out stepped its legal bounds through the document. Her law firm is prepared to sue the government over the memo and has drafted a 28-page brief for a lawsuit and also sent a letter to the USCIS.

“We are challenging the government and telling them to revisit it,” Murthy said. She expects to get a response to her letter and will proceed forward depending on the response.

Though she feels confident that her firm has a case in regards to USCIS attempting to increase H1-B restrictions without going through the proper legislative channels to do so, she does admit concerns that moving forward with a lawsuit may be difficult because companies do not want to come forward and be part of it, choosing instead to try and work around the USCIS’ increased stringency.

Sheela Murthy

“Everyone is afraid of repercussions,” Murthy said. “The problem is I don’t want to threaten a lawsuit if people are not going to help me sue.”

At the end of the day, she feels the increased immigration scrutiny is increasingly coming down on immigration lawyers, who have to work harder and harder to get the results clients are looking for.

Scott Cooper, managing partner for the Michigan office of immigration law firm Fragomen, Del Rey Bernsen & Loewy PLLC, sees less and less of the results clients want happening – especially in regards to the different visa categories.

“[The documentation process for most visa categories] is very burdensome on the employer and it is very discouraging,” Cooper said.

Fragomen, Del Rey Bernsen & Loewy, which was started in New York, has more than 1,000 immigration professionals in over 30 offices in 14 countries and Cooper said the United States is increasingly becoming one of the most difficult places for immigrants to come and start businesses. “We are trying to shoehorn these people who want to create small- and medium-sized businesses into one category or another and the government is fighting us tooth-and-nail.”

He believes the more difficult the United States makes it to transfer in skilled personal the more companies will look outside the country for options. “It is almost like the government is trying to offshore jobs,” Cooper said. “And it is very counterproductive.”

When asked what he thinks it will take for immigration reform to happen, Cooper admits the belief that there is very little that good trigger any movement on the topic currently. “We are just too close to an election for an immigration bill. It is just too hot of a topic,” he said.

Beyond that he is not too optimistic. “They are trying to get health care done and it is a question of who is up next,” Cooper added. “I am not very encouraged.”

Immigration attorney Hanishi Ali, a founding partner at Westborough, Mass.-based Mithras Law Group, takes heart in the fact that President Obama continues to publicly say he is still supporting immigration reform.

“It is promising to hear that Pres. Obama still supports comprehensive immigration reform,” Ali said. “At least he hasn’t forgotten, but clearly we are going to deal with health care and the economy first.”

Still, like most of her immigration colleagues, she is insistent that comprehensive immigration reform must happen and that is the message that must be sent to the nation’s lawmakers. “We have to make legislators understand the pros and cons of this and really there aren’t that many cons.”.

You Might Also Like :