House Relents on DHS Funding Debate; Leaves Executive Action on Immigration to Be Fought in the Courts

According to recent reports, the U.S. State Department (DOS) may issue a worldwide priority date cut-off for the EB-2 (Employment-Based, second preference) category in July. The precise EB-2 cut-off date will be unveiled in the July 2012 Visa Bulletin, which is expected to be released in mid-June. At this time it has not yet been confirmed how far back the priority dates are expected to retrogress.

In the wake of the Paris terrorist attacks, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill on Tuesday, December 8, 2015, to tighten security measures and impose new restrictions on the Visa Waiver Program (VWP). The VWP permits citizens of 38 designated countries, mostly in Europe, to travel to the United States for business or tourism for 90 days or less without a visa. The bill, which passed in the House by a vote of 407 to 19, would prohibit anyone who has traveled to Iraq, Syria, Iran, or Sudan within the past five years from participating in the program; require the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to terminate a country’s participation in the program if the country fails to share counterterrorism information; require all VWP countries to use electronic passports with chips that contain biometric information; and mandate that participating countries more thoroughly screen travelers against international counterterrorism databases.

The purpose of the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act is to protect workers by requiring advance notice of plant closings. Such notice allows workers some time to adjust to the prospective loss of employment, and to seek other jobs or retraining. The WARN Act requires generally 60 days’ written notice before a closing or mass layoff by covered employers (typically, those with at least 100 full-time employees at a site).