News Update - March 14, 2007

By Alan Lee, Esq.^†‡

Citizenship Promotion Act of 2007 introduced in Congress

The Citizenship Promotion Act of 2007 (S.795) was introduced in the Senate by Barack Obama – (D – IL.), Jeff Bingaman (D- NM), Robert Menendez (D – NJ), and Ken Salazar (D-CO.). The Act provides for Congress to appropriate funds to the Department of Homeland Security to recover indirect costs of adjudication processing. A purpose of this bill is to deter a proposed increase in adjudication fees. In addition the bill outlines uniform testing parameters and voluntary electronic filing procedures. The bill also provides that if background checks are not completed in 90-days, the Attorney General must document the reason, and if not completed with 210 days must report to Congress and the DHS. The bill was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee and may be retrieved at http://thomas.loc.gov.

Bipartisan “American Dream Act” Re-introduced

A bill authorizing temporary legal status leading to permanent residence status for those high school students brought or left in the U.S. illegally who will attend college or join the U.S. military was introduced in the House of Representatives. The Act also eliminates a federal provision discouraging States from providing in-state tuition rates to long residing immigrant students, who now must pay international tuition rates. The bill is co-sponsored by Representatives Howard Berman (D-Cal), Lucille Roybal-Allard (D- Cal), and Lincoln Diaz-Balart (R-Fl.) and is currently before the Judiciary Committee and the Committee on Education and Labor. A companion measure will be introduced in the Senate.

† The author is a 26+ year practitioner of immigration law based in New York City. He was awarded the Sidney A. Levine prize for best legal writing at the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law in 1977 and has written extensively on immigration over the past years for the ethnic newspapers, World Journal, Sing Tao, Pakistan Calling, Muhasha and OCS. He has testified as an expert on immigration in civil court proceedings and was recognized by the Taiwan government in 1985 for his work protecting human rights. His article, "The Bush Temporary Worker Proposal and Comparative Pending Legislation: an Analysis" was Interpreter Releases' cover display article at the American Immigration Lawyers Association annual conference in 2004, and his victory in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in a case of first impression nationwide, Firstland International v. INS, successfully challenged INS' policy of over 40 years of revoking approved immigrant visa petitions under a nebulous standard of proof. Its value as precedent, however, was short-lived as it was specifically targeted by the Administration in the Intelligence Reform Act of 2004.

‡ This article © 2007 Alan Lee, Esq.

Copyright © 2003-2012 Alan Lee, Esq.
The information provided here is of a general nature and may not apply to any particular set of facts or circumstances. It should not be construed as legal advice and does not constitute an engagement of the Law Office of Alan Lee or establish an attorney-client relationship.