By now all of you have had the chance to review the latest visa bulletin issued by the Department of state this past week. Looking at the priority dates gives us a feeling of déjà vu lately and we are sure you feel the same way. In June of 2012 the EB2 India date retrogressed to being unavailable. While EB3 India reached September of 2002 in the same month the minimal crawl forward was nothing to write home about. Since then, barring a few months last year when some spillover visas became available, the dates are essentially stuck at almost a decade ago. While the dates for EB2 China are better, they remain well behind EB3 China thus making mockery of the supposed logic of this immigration system. We have tried watching the visa bulletins and waiting, praying, cursing and sometimes just silently agonizing over the situation and none of it has helped our cause.
Over these last few years many of us have been actively organizing and advocating for immigration reform as you already know. Given the political battles on Capitol Hill, this has been an uphill climb at every step. Still, we have had notable success in creating serious credibility for ourselves on this issue and fighting our way to a seat at the adult table where immigration reform will live or die this year.
Many of those who go to DC on a regular basis and lobby their lawmakers at home have Green Cards in hand already. Despite that, we consider this cause important enough that we have kept participating and contributing. If we have to win though, this is not enough.
This year, the Republicans in the House have finally come around to the
cause of immigration reform. This is a momentous change and the chances of something moving are higher than they have been in a very long time. It’s up to us though to seize the moment. The current proposals are inadequate for us, they don’t provide increased Green Card numbers and don’t address the backlog, in fact they threaten to make it worse. If we want our problems to be addressed meaningfully, we have to stand up for ourselves now. A few of us working on this will not succeed. We need you to join us in DC this March for an advocacy event. While we need you there, you need it as much and more because you owe it to yourself and to your family to step up and make yourself heard.
This will be an experience you will not forget.
We will not only meet lawmakers and their staff, but also visit the White House. Not only will you help solve your immigration problems, you will grow in every way, personal and professional. So join us…you will not regret it. The details are below. The first step is to register so we can help you with logistics in DC. Use this opportunity to be a part of the immigration reform process.
