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Home: Healthcare Industry News
Source: Hammond Law Group HEALTHCARE IMMIGRATION ALERT! APRIL 20, 2005
RETROGRESSION LEGISLATION: MIKULSKI AMENDMENT ADDED TO APPROPRIATIONS BILL
The effort to recapture unused immigrant visa numbers (and eliminate retrogression) took a major step forward yesterday when the Senate added Sen. Mikulski's amendment to the "must pass" Iraq War Appropriations legislation. Sen. Mikulski's amendment, which mainly focuses on increasing the seasonal worker quota, includes language that HLG and its allies have long sought -- a recapture of about 150,000 authorized but unused immigrant visa numbers. The recapture legislation sets aside half of the recaptured numbers exclusively for nurses and physical therapists. The other half may be used by all occupations.
Once the Senate's appropriations bill is finalized, the Senate and the House must get their legislation in agreement, a process known as "conference committee." An earlier House appropriations bill does not include Sen. Mikulski's language. The House's version includes the controversial REAL-ID legislation, which could threaten the recapture legislation. Accordingly, we are now focusing on convincing key House members of the need for immigrant visas to reduce the dire nursing and therapist shortage.
The actual language of the amendment The language as modified and accepted by unanimous consent was amendment #0379 to HR 1268. Reads: On page 231, between lines 3 and 4, insert the following new section: Recapture of Visas Sec.6047. section 106(d)(2)(a) of the American competitiveness in the twenty-first century act of 2000 (PL106-313; 8 USC 1153 note) is amended- (1)in paragraph (1), by inserting before the period at the end of the second sentence "and any such visa that is made available due to the difference between the number of employment-based visas that were made available in fiscal year 2001,2002,2003 or 2004 and the number of such visas that were actually used in such fiscal year shall be made available only to employment-based immigrants and the dependants of such immigrants, and 50% of such visas shall be made available to those whose immigrant worker petitions were approved based on schedule A, as defined in section 656.5 of title 20, Code of Federal Regulations, as promulgated by the Secretary of Labor"; and (2) in paragraph(2)(A) by striking "and 2000" and inserting "through 2004"
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