Letter to the secretary of State : Guys everybody send one

[neha_wal]

Guys I have written this letter to the secretary of state and copied to director of USCIS, Secretary of Labor. I urge you to write them too and to more people you think it should be sent.

Help us live with Dignity
Dear Madam,
I want to draw your attention to the plight of 100s of 1000s of H1B workers and their families. With the current Backlogs for foreign labor certifications at the department of Labor and with the set of rules that were existing or came in effect in past 2-3 years our life has become miserable. I want to draw you attention on some particular rules that have affected us adversely.

1) Discontinuing of Stamping of visas in the U.S. by the State department. Now we live in the country without any Visa’s on our passport and do not travel abroad and we restrain from getting it stamped in our home countries as most of the embassies are having backlog of 4-5 months.

2) Backlog centers to clear the foreign Labors. These centers were created about 20 months ago. We still don’t know when we are going to get our Labor Certifications.

3) H1B visas for 1 year after one complete 6 years.

4) Most states are giving driver’s license up to the expiry of the Visa.

I want to suggest few steps which could make our life better.

1) Make the Green Card process portable after 2 years have past when the green card process started, beginning the labor certification. This is helpful as in the current scenario with Labor certification taking endless time and priority dates of the green card Visas being retrogressed we are stuck with one employer endlessly, while the employer can end the employment anytime. Say I stayed with the employer for 7 years and just 1 month before I was to get my green card my employer lays me off. I get nothing.

2) Give H1B extensions for 3 years after 2 years have past when the green card process started, beginning the labor certification. Irrespective of number of years a person has lived in the country on H1B. This is helpful because Labor certification has got into an endless loop and priority Dates have been retrogressed grossly worldwide. After completion of 6 years on H1B we get just 1 year extensions. It makes things so difficult, as we are ready for another extension as soon as the current extension comes in. We can’t get it stamped on the passport, we can’t travel. We have to run for Driver’s license every year. It’s a vicious circle.

3) Restart stamping of Visas in U.S. The reason giving by the state department for discontinuing it was they wanted the finger printing of all the foreigner’s in the U.S. but that could be achieved by asking the Visa applicant to get the finger printing done at the local police station.