Immigrate to the Land of Opportunity
The USA is a panacea for the economic woes of many people all over the world. It is a land for the ‘free and the brave,’ which is why many people wish to immigrate and settle there. It offers a space where people can practice and celebrate their culture, their race, their religion in a free and democratic environment, without fearing discrimination or racism of any kind whatsoever. Moreover, it is a ground where people are free to live the ubiquitous ‘American Dream” to the fullest. But there is a cravat here, and that is that U.S. immigration law as a rule tends to be very complex indeed, and there is a whole lot of confusion as to how precisely the whole immigration deal works. In fact, there actually exists an organization known as the ‘the Immigration and Naturalization Act or INA) and that is the main body of law that actively governs current immigration policy, as it exists in the USA today. And any Immigration Lawyer Kissimmee worth his salt will be able to give full and accurate knowledge of the myriad different legal nuances and variations regarding the whole framework of laws, as they exist in the USA. This is with regard to the’ federal and state policies for immigrants all over the country and specially, in terms of any good Immigration Lawyer Kissimmee. As per federal policies regarding immigration to the USA, here is a point to be noted. The INA provides for an annual global limit of an estimated 675,000 permanent immigrants to the USA, in terms of both skilled and unskilled workers. However, there exist certain exceptions for otherwise closely knit families whose members may have been separated due to trans-national policies. The INA provides for the reunification of such families, as soon as it is humanly possible (subject that is, to stringent back ground checks to ensure there is no criminal or terrorist background of the person being given the permanent residency permit). All duly vetted and lawful permanent residency permits, essentially allow any particular foreign national to both work as well as live lawfully and permanently in any and all territories that currently comprises the United States of America, as of today. In fact, lawful permanent residents or LPRs as they are more popularly known are also eligible to apply for almost ‘all’ jobs. (Here, the cravat includes ‘all jobs that are not legitimately restricted to actual U.S. citizens’ alone. These include sensitive jobs such as being a part of the NSA or national security agency or the department of Homeland security or the central intelligence agency, amongst others). Furthermore, individuals who have been awarded a certificate of permanent residency can also remain in the United States of America, even if they are actively unemployed or have been laid off. Moreover, the United States also admits many non-citizens as well, every year, albeit on a temporary basis. Lastly, both the Congress and the President, determine a separate and distinct number for refugees fleeing prosecution in their own native countries. The number of people allowed on this basis changes from year to year based on the geo-political conditions (both at home and abroad) prevalent at that point in time of the admission of their visa application. Your friendly neighbourhood immigration Lawyer Kissimmeewill help you and your family members immigrate and start a new life in the United States as per the following principles that apply to immigration here. These include the following practices
- The reunification of close families
- The admittance to the United States of immigrants with skills that are deemed highly valuable to the U.S. economy
- The protection of refugees fleeing for their lives
- The promotion of diversity all over the country
o Family related Immigration policies
The reunification of the family unit is one of the single most important principles that currently govern the immigration policy in the United States. The family-based immigration category allows U.S. citizens and LPRs to bring certain family members to the United States. As a matter of fact, virtually all family based immigrants that are admitted as permanent residents have to be either the immediate relatives of actual U.S. citizens or applicants through the ‘family preference system.’ Policies regarding these two systems may be described as follows:o Immediate relatives category
Any and all prospective immigrants that are currently under the immediate relatives’ category must meet certain eligibility criteria that are actually standard with all the immigrants that apply for a permanent residency permit though this category with the help of an Immigration Lawyer Kissimmee. Here, the petitioners (i.e. the person desirous of immigrating to the US) needs must meet certain criteria with reference to both age and minimum financial requirements. Such immediate relatives include:- The spouses (wives, husbands or common law partners where applicable) of U.S. citizens
- Any unmarried minor child (or children as the case may be) of a U.S. citizens (said person has to be under 21 years of age) and lastly
- The parents of any U.S. citizen (Here the petitioner is the US citizen who is applying on behalf of his or her parent or parents, should be at least of 21 years of age for his petition to be taken into consideration).
o The family preference system
As any good Immigration Lawyer Kissimmee, will tell you, there are already a limited number of US visas that are available every year as per the ‘family preference system’. But for this system to apply, it is imperative that any prospective immigrant or for that matter immigrants as the case may be) must meet certain standardized eligibility criteria, including both, petitioners’ age related requirements, as well as minimum financial solvency. The family preference system includes the following basic criteria:- Any adult offspring of a citizen of the United States of America (either married or unmarried) and also blood relatives such as the brothers and sisters of a U.S. citizen (here the petitioner applying on behalf of his immediate blood relatives should have attained at least 21 years of age before they can apply for either their own children or for that matter, their siblings
- Any spouse (husband or wife or common law partner – for common law partners, the law varies from state to state) and also unmarried children (either minor or even an adult) of a legal Permanent Resident
o The Immigration figure calculations
This is why, in order to balance the overall net number of fresh immigrants that immigrate to the US, based on the acceptance of their petitions with regard to family relationships. Both the US government and congress have successfully established a highly complicated system of immigration for the purpose of calculating the total available number of all family preference visas of any particular given year. The number is determined by starting with a single (arbitrary) number of 480,000 (approx.) subsequently, the total number of visas that are given to immediate relatives during the previous year are subtracted from the above mentioned figure of .420 million. Then the figures of the total number of illegal aliens that have been “paroled” into the U.S.A during the preceding year are also subtracted from the base figure. After that any employment preference immigrant numbers that have as yet being unused from the preceding year are then added to the above sum so as to establish the total number of immigration related visas that still remain for allocation, courtesy the overall preference system. However, as per the law of the land, the sum total number of family based visas that are typically allocated through the preference system alone may not be necessarily be lower than the total figure of 226,000 alone. However, in actual reality, (thanks to the joint family system that is more common in the US then many other nations in the Western world) there is a fairly large number of immediate relatives vying for the same visa pool. This is precisely why the actual number of visas that are granted though the preference system is far higher than the ones that available every year (typically 226,000 or so).Subsequently, the sum total number of all family based and similarly related visas quite often exceed the 480,000 number of visas that are mandated by the law. As a matter of fact, just in the Fiscal Year (FY) 2014 alone, (scarcely half a decade back or so) family based immigrants actually comprised a whopping 64 percent of all fresh legal permanent residents that were granted this precious document in the United States with the help of their trusted Immigration Lawyer Kissimmee.o Criteria for admission
In order for any prospective applicant to be admitted via the extended family based immigration system, (either as an immediate relative of though the family preference system), it is imperative for a U.S. citizen or for that matter an LPR sponsor to meet certain requirements with regard to their petition courtesy their trusted Immigration Lawyer Kissimmee. The chief requirement of which would be the establishment of the due legitimacy of the immediate relationship. After that they have to meet the minimum income requirements as well (in a bid to prove that they can take care of the new dependents till such time as they are able to get on to their own feet), and lastly they have to sign an ‘affidavit of support’ that will state to the effect that the sponsor will take full financial responsibility for any and all the family member(s) that they have sponsored upon their arrival into the USA.o Derivative immigrants
The spouses and/or children who are accompanying the principal immigrants or will shortly be following them are typically referred to as ‘derivative immigrants’. Here a point to be noted is that ‘the sum total number of visas that are typically granted to derivative immigrants are always counted under the particularly appropriate category limits. Let us take for example the year 2013 and the family based statistics pertaining to that particular year:o Derivative immigrant statistics for FY 2013
- 65,536 individuals had been admitted as the siblings of U.S. citizens
- 27,022 were ‘actual’ (or blood relative) siblings of U.S. citizens (who were the principal immigrants in this case
- 14,891 were spouses (husbands, wives or common law partners) of the principal (or actual) immigrants;
- 23,623 derivative immigrants were the children of the principal immigrants