The US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) released a Spanish-language version of Form M-274, the Handbook for Employers on July 27, 2012. The Handbook provides employers with detailed guidance on complying with their employment eligibility verification obligations, and was previously available only in English.

For more resources on employment eligibility verification, see Immigration Compliance Toolkit.

On July 18, 2012, the USCIS Director Alejandro N. Mayorkas announced the creation of a new USCIS office to oversee the EB5 investor visa program. The creation of the new office highlights the importance of the EB5 visa category, which provides an avenue for immigration to the US based on an investment of either:

For more information, see Practice Note, Hiring and Employing Foreign Nationals in the US: Overview: EB5 Category and Key Immigrant Visa Classifications Chart: Employment-based Fifth Preference Category (EB5).

On July 18, 2012, the Department of Labor (DOL) launched a website providing users one place to access foreign labor certification performance data including:

For more information on some DOL programs, see Practice Notes:

On July 16, 2012, USCIS issued E-Verify self-assessment guides for direct access users and web services users. The guides help E-Verify users comply with the program's requirements and prevent unauthorized use or manipulation of the system. It gives users tips on developing self-assessment programs to detect and correct misuse of the system.

For more information on E-Verify, see Practice Note, E-Verify for Employers: Best Practices.

In a July 12, 2012 decision, Liu v. Mund, 7th Cir. No. 11-1453 (July 12, 2012), the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit found that the beneficiary of an affidavit of support is not obligated to mitigate damages by seeking employment. In Liu, the affidavit was executed by Mr. Mund, a US citizen, for Ms. Liu as a required part of his green card sponsorship of her as his foreign national spouse. After the parties divorced, Mr. Mund refused to pay Ms. Liu financial support because Ms. Liu was not actively seeking employment as required by their divorce decree. Ms. Liu sued Mr. Mund for financial support, citing his obligations under the immigration affidavit of support, Form I-864, instead of the divorce decree.

In its decision, the Seventh Circuit notes that mitigation is not included in the USCIS regulations listing explicit exclusions from the affidavit of support obligations, and that the legislative history did not support creating one. It therefore held Mr. Mund liable for the support required by the affidavit.

For general information on immigration sponsorship in the business context, see Practice Note, Business Immigration Sponsorship: Overview: Immigrant Visa (Green Card) Sponsorship and Key Immigrant Visa Classifications Chart.

On July 9, 2012, the DOL's Employment and Training Administration issued a notice extending a comment period for 60 days on newly proposed changes to the Labor Condition Application (LCA). Among several minor changes, the DOL suggests two major changes:

The DOL seeks these changes to make LCA enforcement easier. Comments will be accepted through September 7, 2012. For more information and a chart highlighting the section-by-section changes to the LCA, see the DOL's statement supporting the changes. For the suggested drafts, see the Draft ETA Form 9035 (LCA) and Draft ETA 9035 (LCA) Cover Pages.

On June 26, 2012, the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled on lawful permanent resident (LPR) status abandonment in Lateef v. Holder, No. 10-3354 (6th Cir., June 26, 2012). In its decision, the Sixth Circuit held that the petitioner, Humaira Lateef, abandoned her LPR status by travelling to Pakistan for more than 180 days without obtaining a reentry permit and spending more than half her time as an LPR in Pakistan rather than the US. The court found that although Lateef travelled to Pakistan to be with her husband and children, who were waiting for issuance of their visas to the US, she did not take sufficient steps to show that the trip was intended to be short or temporary.

The dissent objected to the majority's ruling, finding instead that the court was overturning its precedential holding in Hana v. Gonzales, 400 F.3d 472 (6th Cir. 2005), which named four factors to evaluate whether the petitioner abandoned her LPR status, including the petitioner's:

For more information on maintenance of lawful permanent residence status, see Practice Note, Business Immigration Sponsorship: Overview: Green Card: Rights and Obligations.

The California Governor's Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz) updated its website with a new policy for issuing Targeted Employment Area (TEA) certifications to support EB5 applications through a Regional Center, requiring an investment of $500,000 rather than the base $1 million. TEAs are either rural areas, or areas suffering from high unemployment, defined as at least 150% of the national average unemployment rate. Certification may be made by the USCIS or by the government of the state in which the investment will be made.

Under GO-Biz's new policy, TEA eligibility for locations in California has been pre-determined based on local unemployment rates and are posted on GO-Biz's website. Certifications will be issued individually based on investor requests.

For more information on the EB5 category, see Practice Note, Hiring and Employing Foreign Nationals in the US: Overview: EB5 Category and Key Immigrant Visa Classifications Chart: Employment-based Fifth Preference Category (EB5).