I would highly encourage international students to reconsider their plans of studying in the US. I am coming from my own personal experience, but as you can read from this thread or any immigration forum, the policies of the current administration are increasingly hostile towards immigrants. Especially, Chinese and Indian students should rethink. Few reasons why not to study in the US:
1. USCIS has made the OPT process increasingly difficult as yo u can read from this article. However, OPT is the only option if you want to work in the US post graduation. Chances of getting an employer prior to graduation, who can file your H1 in April and wait for you to join in October is close to zero
2. H1 visa is a crapshoot lottery and if you are not a STEM student, you will most likely get one shot at it. If you are not picked, that's the end of it
3. Even if you get selected in H1, 70% of cases result in RFE for BS reasons that a hostile USCIS agent made up on the spot. H1 laws are so vague that a rogue USCIS officer can make up any reason to deny your petition.
4. Even if you get an approved H1 petition, it comes with a ton of strings attached. And if you travel out of the country you have to get a visa from your home country or Canada or Mexico. The visa process also been made extremely difficult, with routine delays and 3-6 months wait in many cases. Imagine being stuck abroad and having to let your employer know that they have to wait months before you can be back.
5. If you are an Indian student currently, the path to green card simply doesn't exist. There is a 100 year wait for a green card
6. Points #1-5 above are not bugs, but features. US education only makes sense for rich students, who want to study for a few years and return. But then, why would you want to study in the US and deal with the harassment in US consulates and embassies to get an F-1 visa or deal with hostile CBP agents who treat you like enemies after flying for 40 hours.
I disagree. I studied at CCNY in NYC and did internships at Stanford University and for Google's GSoC using my CPT, and then worked for a cool startup for 2+ years on OPT and extension. We then did the H1B lottery and didn't get selected so I had to leave.
It's not fun, but I don't regret it. I had a super good time in the US, learned a lot, and it opened my mind in many ways. I think if people are interested in spending time in the US, it's worth taking a shot, even with all that immigration struggle.
That's true. The U.S. is indeed a great place to live, and the people are really friendly and treat you as one of them (at least in NY and CA). But unfortunately the immigration laws are kafkaesque and designed to keep immigrants out, and the current administration is making it even more worse.
Considering that around 20% of the world's immigrants live in the US, saying that US immigration is "designed to keep immigrants out" is grossly misleading.
The number may be wrong the sentiment seems reasonable. I would hardly call the U.S. hostile toward immigrants. I can’t think of many other countries that are as diverse as the U.S. Just in my apartment building I live next to a Russian couple, a Chinese couple, a Korean couple, and a Guatemalan couple.
Americans could be forgiven for having poll whiplash this week.
"Shock poll: Americans want massive cuts to legal immigration," said a headline from the Washington Times.
"Americans broadly embrace the Democratic immigration position," declared a Washington Post headline, with the release of a new ABC/Washington Post poll.
On immigration, as on any other issue, it can seem that there's a poll result that supports just about any position. Here's a look at immigration polls to explain what findings are shaky — and to highlight what can reasonably be concluded about Americans' views on immigration.
Immigration is one of the most divisive and polarised issues in US public policy, and one that brought to power the current POTUS. Saying the public unilateraly supports one side or another is naive at best, intentionally misleading at worst.
Define "immigration". One of the problems that smart, educated, intern-level immigrants have is they are getting caught in the crossfire of millions of uneducated day-laborers streaming over the border.
We should have increased immigration on a merit-based system (obviously college students would be a strong merit).
Surely from an economic perspective, the "best" immigrants are the kind who earn a lot, paying a lot of taxes into your state/country, while not using a lot of taxpayer dollars in terms of social services, not having a lot of children who go to public schools, etc?
To add to your pt.5, even if you were an Indian student in the last decade (like me in 07-09),even if you went to one of the top 5 universities in your field and even if you are in a high paying job (___location adjusted), the path to GC doesn't realistically exist.
People like me got screwed the most because when we started basing our lives here, there was a 5-7 wait for a green card. It has been a decade since but still no realistic path exists as the wait has grown exponentially.
>To add to your pt.5, even if you were an Indian student in the last decade (like me in 07-09),even if you went to one of the top 5 universities in your field and even if you are in a high paying job (___location adjusted), the path to GC doesn't realistically exist.
Well, technically, it does if you're in the O or EB-1 category. But probably over 95% of Indians are not.
Since it has not bee mentioned yet, the priority date for Indians in EB-2 (typically a MS or PhD degree) is June 1, 2009. This means they are currently processing candidates who had cleared their labor certification by June 1, 2009 - over a decade ago.
That date has barely moved in the last decade. I remember it being about 2006 back in 2012. It quickly moved to 2008, and then regressed all the way back to 2003, and then jumped to 2008 again.
I know Indians who started working in 2008. Because of the economic downturn, the company did not apply for their green card (almost guaranteed to get rejected as it's pretty hard to show a shortage in a recession). The company finally applied for them in 2011, so their priority date is 2011. They've been working over a decade, and USCIS is not even close to processing them.
Once you have a priority date, a change in job, or a change in ___location is not a realistic option. The laws allow you to do it, but then the employer has to redo the labor certification, potentially risking a rejection, or a new priority date.
Things have been bad for Indians since the Obama days. Whatever Trump may have added to it is just noise.
(Edit: Amusingly, the priority date for Indians with only a BS degree (EB-3) is April 2010. They are now ahead of the MS/PhD's in the queue. They usually lagged by several years. Interesting...)
>US education only makes sense for rich students, who want to study for a few years and return.
I want to add that it doesn't make sense at all for funded PhD students, whose advisors draw a lot of funds from the state and federal governments to support them. We're spending a lot of public money educating international students, then forcing that talent and investment out the door when they're done. Why not keep them in the country for a bit to innovate for American companies and pay income taxes?
1. Most of them do not want to stay for a bit but permanently so when asked to leave after x years they will be even more unhappy because now they have settled down, made friends and raising family etc. And I am sympathetic to this argument.
2. Sending immediately back also seems morally right thing to do. While US companies may benefit a bit but 3rd world is in desperate need of well trained experts. Sending those PhDs etc back may be more helpful in getting those countries develop and become self dependent than just aid programmes.
There are also many European universities that are welcoming of international students. I'd steer clear from the UK for now, though. No idea how hard it is to get a EU student visa compared to a Canadian one, though.
Well... how else do you pay back the loan you take to study in USA? This is a problem for a huge portion of students, immigrant or not.
You can argue that students can go back to their own country and repay the loan? That is practically impossible for almost every student coming from India and China.
Banks cooperate internationally, you're on the hook both in your home country(or whatever country the co-signer is from)and the country the college is in. it's impossible to just skip out on loans nowadays(unless the trusted co-signer disappears with you ofc)
Foreign students get loans from their home country not the US. No US institution will lend to a foreign student without a domestic co-signer, for precisely this reason.
No, there's not. That's a hyperbolic projection which requires assuming no one ever leaves the queue (not by giving g up, not by dying, not by no longer being qualified) except by reaching he head and getting a visa.
Obviously, over a 100 year wait time, that's not remotely possible, even as a rough approximation.
Which is not to say the situation isn't miserable for Indian (Chinese, Mexican, and Filipino, too) GC applicants in many categories (not the same ones for each), but it’s not a 100 year long wait.
Indian students in family have been choosing Germany and Australia since Trump took over. USCIS has devolved into a garbage agency that pushes Trumps agenda that he can not achieve legally.
This was perfectly said, and spot on. (Thank you.)
Reading about how Canada welcomes skilled immigrants, almost brought tears to my eyes. If your English is good and you've studied in Canada (even just a bachelor's degree), you're given a Post-Graduation Work Permit (PGWP) upon graduation, and are practically guaranteed to eventually get a Canadian green card via the Canadian Experience Class (Express Entry) program.
For folks outside Canada, good English, education beyond a bachelor's degree, and 3 years of skilled work experience, guarantees you'll have enough points to get a Federal Skilled Worker green card immediately.
I haven't looked at countries besides Canada; but I would strongly recommend Canada over the U.S. for anyone seeking to migrate on the basis of skills.
> I haven't looked at countries besides Canada; but I would strongly recommend Canada over the U.S. for anyone seeking to migrate on the basis of skills.
I would also suggest to consider the Netherlands. The procedure for highly skilled migrants is super simple. Pretty much the only condition is that your employer pays you a sufficient wage.
> I would also suggest to consider the Netherlands
Unless you want to become a citizen, you'll need to learn Dutch (which is a good thing IMHO but some disagree) and renounce your other citizenship.
Sweden has an even simpler system, if the employer can prove that you are needed (and for most professions reading here that's less than trivial) you are almost guaranteed to get permanent residency in 4 years and become a citizen in 5 years if you want to
You can get permanent residence after 5 years in the Netherlands too, and the language level required is pretty basic. It's not very hard to pass the required language tests within 5+ years.
The limit to one nationality is maddening, however.
I just moved to the Netherlands after four years of university in the US and a few years of unsuccessful H1B applications. It's fantastic and a lot less stressful than the US!
Because it is deeply arbitrary. Plenty of people can have dual nationalities in the Netherlands, just not me. Even the Dutch Queen has two nationalities. If I married a Dutch person I could become Dutch and have two nationalities, no problem. Hopefully the law will be changed...there has been talk of it.
I'm already eligible to apply for Dutch citizenship...I'm a well-integrated contributing member of society who would love to spend the rest of my life in the Netherlands. I tick all the boxes. I want to be able to vote and have representation (I'm a taxpayer as anyone else, after all). I want to spend the rest of my life here. But it's not limited to the Netherlands...I dearly want to become European. Dutch citizenship would give me the right to live and work anywhere in the EU (and plenty of other EU countries have no issues with people having two nationalities).
I can't give up my US citizenship because of family and other ties. If I needed to return to the US for an extended time (e.g. more than a couple months) to, for example, take care of my aging parents, I would lose everything I've worked towards in the Netherlands. The residence clock would reset and I'd have to find a new highly-skilled job and start all over. Same if I ever wanted to take a (temporary) job in another country. And if you renounce US citizenship, it's hard to ever visit the US again.
Canada is an English speaking country except Québec. Why would a highly skilled immigrant learn yet another language to immigrate to Netherlands, if given a choice between an English speaking country and non English one ?
Everybody speaks English in the Netherlands. People live there for years without learning the local language. Working language in many companies that hire migrants is English.
Can those employees progress in their career without speaking the native language ?
Will the kids get an education in English ?
Can the immigrant take part in social activities ?
Can they talk to their doctors or to the grocery store in English without misunderstanding.
How is the attitude towards English ? Will a nationalist government change those English friendliness ?
There are things like these a skilled economic immigrant should consider before immigrating to a non English speaking country.
Take the example of Québec, although it's a province in the English speaking Canada, immigrants who speak only English are not welcomed and frowned upon. They find it hard to get by. They end up moving to other provinces. If the immigrant is not white, the difficulties are 2x in Québec. To be fair, Québec's hate for English is well founded if you examine their colonial history and hence the strict language laws.
Because very often English is the language of business, and the highly-skilled migrant visa makes no demands of you to learn Dutch. Practically speaking, Netherlands is (enough of) an English speaking place.
US immigration policy is now somewhat akin to charity rather than intended to maximize the highly skilled talent pool. This isn't intended as a criticism, but by and large most of our immigration pool comes from poor countries and does not have specialized skills. And we're pretty lenient on illegal immigration which is largely low skilled labor as well. There's a movement right now to change it to be more like the Canada system, more closely based on skill. Whether that's better or worse is subjective I suppose.
> US immigration policy is now somewhat akin to charity rather than intended to maximize the highly skilled talent pool.
No, it's not.
It's largely intended to acheive different social values (particularly community cohesion and undivided loyalties, as opposed to optimizing labor pool to serve capital), which is why the major segment is family unification, but it's not a charity, operating on s need basis (the refugee component is charity-like, sure, but that's not a main component of the immigration system, and the US isn't particularly refugee friendly, even before Trump.)
> But Canada’s hospitable attitude is not innate; it is, rather, the product of very hardheaded government policies. Ever since the mid-1960s, the majority of immigrants to the country (about 65 percent in 2015) have been admitted on purely economic grounds, having been evaluated under a nine-point rubric that ignores their race, religion and ethnicity and instead looks at their age, education, job skills, language ability and other attributes that define their potential contribution to the national work force.
The Government of Canada enacted that policy because it's what the people of Canada demanded. The government doesn't make us be welcoming, we make the government be welcoming.
But is your policy particularly welcoming? It’s basically, “you’re welcome here, but only if you speak English and preferably have a college degree.” I took the Canadian points-based immigration test for funsies (it’s online). If Trump rolled out the exact same test here—particularly with the focus on English language proficiency—it would be pilloried by our left as racist, classist, and xenophobic.
I don't want to get into political debates, but this is wrong. Democrats have always pushed for a merit-based points-based immigration for a while now. The 2013 immigration bill contained a merit-based system not unlike Canada's. A points-based system would only be pilloried by your caricature of the left.
The fact of the matter is that the GOP is often quite dishonest. In public, they say things that often sound very reasonable, and hold positions similar to that of the Democrats/left (points-based immigration, protect pre-existing conditions, retain medicare, etc) -- and it helps them win votes. But as we all know, what they actually do (with executive action, bills introduced in Congress, etc) is often the very opposite of what they say.
The 2013 proposal was very different from the Canadian system. First, the points based system would get, at most, less than half of visas, and the merit based category (tier 1) would get half of those. So less than 1/4 of visas would be merit based, versus 65% in Canada. Second, even the merit based category had a family ties component. That component was worth 10 points, twice as much as having a bachelors degree, and the same as having a master’s degree. The other part of the points based system (tier 2) was directed mainly to high-demand, low-skill immigration.
Moreover, the system would not replace the existing family ties based system, but been a large number of additional visas on top of the existing allotment. And it would have granted amnesty on a scale never seen in Canada.
> The fact of the matter is that the GOP is often quite dishonest.
The same can be said of the Democrats. All politicians are dishonest; heck, all human beings are dishonest. The degree to which is a matter of opinion. Any reasonably intelligent person should have no problem constructing a narrative that demonstrates genuine dishonesty on behalf of their ideological enemies. An intellectually honest person can easily demonstrate genuine dishonesty on behalf of both sides.
Through what means did the Canadian public "demand" this policy? How was this public demand measured (in general, and in detail in order to craft the particulars of the policy)?
Québec is an exception to this. Québec do not follow the Express Entry system. Québec has its own immigration system called Québec Skilled Worker Programme which is currently dysfunctional, plagued with delays. Québec gives more importance to knowing French rather than any other skills in selecting immigrants. As a result, Quebec has a pool of unemployable but French speaking immigrants.
Well it seems to me most of the students from India assumed it is kinda shortcut to US permanent residency. And it is no longer happening. The trouble is all grandstanding of students and Indian government of shunning US and instead preferring Europe or Australia is not really working. I recently read an amusing news that Indian government asking european, australian governments to allow more indian students and less restrictive policy on movement. While European telling back that India does have good educational institutes so why do they want to come there in first place. Normally it would be exactly other way round where foreign governments wanted more international students.
At this point of time it is fair to say it is stronger wish of Indian students to migrate to first world. Whereas first world nations are no longer excited to have more students from outside just because they can pay fees but in return most of them want to settle there. This assumption of first world education will include permanent immigration is no longer valid.
More importantly it also exposes hypocrisy of large majority of students who write idealistic crap in admission essays, benefit from huge privilege in grossly unequal society in India and then try to comfortably settle down in egalitarian first world. It is likely protectionist move by US government but these student whining that 'world is not fair' and that they have legitimate rights to visa and GC reeks of something similar to 'White privilege'.
Sounds like Princeton should be offering a CPT course for credits during the summer like pretty much every other top-ranked university. Students would likely have to pay some amount of tuition for those credits, but that is not too bad in the context of a paid internship.
USCIS (the agency that adjudicates OPT cases) is likely massively overloaded with processing border asylum cases at the moment - and recent media reports suggest they have been roping in employees who would usually work other parts of the immigration system to work asylum cases.
This. In fact they don't even need to charge for the course - my school enrolls the student in a 1-credit course in the subsequent semester.
Not providing CPT for internships is probably the worst bureaucracy nightmare for international students. OPT has a high application fee, long turnaround, and takes up time from post-graduation employment. CPT is literally the opposite - I remember stepping into my school's international student office with an offer letter, and 5 minutes later I have my work authorization in hand.
Sorta similar, the trust formed to maintain the London Bridge still exists, but from its investments and historic revenue, has switched to charity work and doesn’t collect tolls anymore.
The writing on the wall has been there for quite some time. I’ve been hearing lots of issues with foreign students facing issues, not just for OPT, but also difficulties getting or continuing assistantships, finding campus jobs, facing direct/indirect threats of losing their visa, etc. This is to be expected; international students are in a vulnerable position, and can be easily taken advantage of by both university officials and by industry (assuming they somehow get a job).
I’d advise any foreign aspirant to avoid the USA for further studies unless they can easily afford tuition. No need to fill university coffers with out-of-state tuition for such degrading treatment.
What's interesting from my perspective as the parent of a US teenager about to start senior year of high school: it's hard not to notice that schools are concurrently less and less friendly toward in-state students. They clearly enjoy those sweet out-of-state dollars. I have a friend who's daughter is captain of the gymnastics team, has a 4.something, all the STEM AP courses, and still got rejected by every UC school. The UC system might as well hang a shingle "Locals, keep out".
I am doing my PhD in Netherlands after studying in Belgium. I also worked in USA for a few years as a software engineer. Work culture is more relaxed in EU. My wife is allowed to work here from day of her arrival even though I am a PhD student. Even on a single salary we were able to travel around Europe. I had the option to study in USA for my PhD. Looking at the current situation, I am very happy with my decision to stay in Europe. Public transport is great, language is not a problem in big cities, and food/wine/beer/cheese is amazing.
Routinely happens to us. We made an offer (full time) to a graduating PhD student (US university) from one of the famous deep learning professors (one of three who won a Turing award recently). The guy really like our team and project yet he had Chinese citizenship and when declining our offer said he simply chose Canada vs US.
As an international student who went to a top US university, I'm faced with a similar situation when it comes to H1B. I understand I have no inherent right to be here, and that part of the reason why H1Bs are difficult to get is because of the many frivoulous petitions on behalf of my countrymen from large IT consultancy companies from my company. But when it comes the option between US and Canada, I'd rather pick Canada just for the peace of mind, even though I'd prefer to work in the US and the salaries in Canada are much lower.
How reciprocal are international study opportunities? What I mean is:
Do US students have similar opportunities to study at foreign universities as foreign students have to study at US universities?
When comparing universities with similar entrance requirements (e.g. state schools, prestigious private schools, ivy league, etc.) are there a comparable number of US and foreign openings?
How often is instruction in English? (I realize this isn't entirely fair, but the reality is that high quality foreign language training isn't available at many US schools in the same way it is in Europe; which isn't the student's fault).
It seems to me that if the opportunities are not symmetrical then it is reasonable for there to be at least some protection/preference for domestic students. However, I think that needs to be balanced against the benefits of attracting foreign talent and expanding diversity. Either way, my understanding is that the US visa system is largely irrational and broken so it should definitely be reformed.
Many many universities open their doors for international students, frequently with courses in English. If you rank the schools here [1] by "International Students", you'll see universities primarily in Europe, the Middle East, APAC.
Often, foreigners pay more than domestic students.
Most countries strictly control employment opportunities for non-citizens, of course.
There are definitely international study opportunities, though the direction usually isn't reciprocal. For example, while Indian students are interested in universities in English speaking countries, there is a sizable international student population in India from East Africa, the Middle East, Iran, and the immediate neighbourhood. Premier institutions, that indian students would kill for, reserve a percentage of seats for students from SAARC countries on the basis of their SATs scores. Private universities offer nicer hostels and emenities for foreign students.
President Trump is trying to reform the US VISA system to make it more consistent with other developed nations. But for some reason any attempt to move to a more merit based system is considered racist by Democratic politicians.
Also, the flood of illegal aliens and faux-asylum seekers is sucking all of the oxygen out of the room as far as having a rational immigration system goes.
My previous employer hired F1 grads not bc they were better but bc they were cheaper. I know that bc I interviewed hires (it’s hard to resist for employers the idea that they can get two guys for almost the price of one).
these opt programs should be regulated same way they do H1, or better eliminate them. If you really want these graduates to stay and work in the country, just give them permanent residency from the start. It’s better for everyone.
What else do you expect? They are international students, undergoing the same undergraduate or graduate education as US citizens. There's no reason to expect them, as a whole, to perform differently than other US citizen new grads. I've seen very smart and diligent F1 students, as well as some clearly just coasting along without motivation. Just like for US citizen students.
> but bc they were cheaper
This depends on where you are but in my experience most Silicon Valley companies do not discriminate in terms of compensation based on nationality for new grads.
> What else do you expect? They are international students, undergoing the same undergraduate or graduate education as US citizens. There's no reason to expect them, as a whole, to perform differently than other US citizen new grads.
The quality of a uni graduate is less about the quality of the uni's teaching and more about the quality of said graduates when they get in, as well as how hard they work while at uni. I would assume, that the average international student who gets into a top university is already better than the average national, due to the higher selection pressure on the former. Also, international students, which in the case of the US, tend to come from a less rich country, are more likely to work hard at uni. They are less satisfied with their financial situation and hence have more to gain.
Having said all that, a lot of lobbying in favour of immigration has the unstated goal of wage depression. It is also not fair to accuse those who are against more immigration of xenophobia or worse. Every political decision has winners and losers and it's easy to be pro-immigration when you profit rather than suffer from it.
well there are plenty of crappy employers out there than just want cheap labor, but there are plenty that just want the best employees available world wide, especially if they compete in a world wide market.
When I worked at Spotify (NYC office), we had many international engineers (french, spanish, indian, chinese, swedish... etc), that got stuck in the H-1B limbo....
Spotify just moved them into the Stockholm office until/when their H-1B went through.... doing the same work, paying Swedish taxes...
The idea that 'less foreign/international' workers more jobs for US employees is partially false, and has two assumptions that are false:
1. Talent/workforce is not mobile (i.e. the same worker that could have been in the US, can't compete with US labour force outside the country, which is false). In case of Spotify, some of the projects which could have been done in NYC, just got done in Stockholm (and Goteborg) instead.
2. Smart people that coming in the US don't increase the overall economic PIE, but just take form the local workforce, which is false as well. Smart people usually raise up/increase the overall economic PIE.
Sure, there is plenty workplaces (usually bodyshops and second rate employees), that use H-1Bs and OPTs for cheap labour, but most serious companies simply want the best engineers available world wide. The government should help/facilitate the second type of employer. There is many ways the H-1B and (OPTs) can be reformed in order to benefit both the local economy and preventing abusers of the system.
Also, when engaged in a new cold war/trade war with China, the US can't afford to squander its most important asset that it has: The ability to attract the best of the world in this country.
If you put barriers for smart people to come in, and your opponent has 4x the number of available talent locally, then you are bound to lose.
While I like the hard stance of Trump with China, the hard stance with smart immigration is just boneheaded and plain stupid....
Yes. These policies also encourage good foreign students in the USA to return to their home country after they graduate (which does in fact happen more and more), which is good for the home country, but bad for the USA. Winning bigly.
Unfortunately the US really has ridiculous Visa policies across the board, with different types of documentation needed for different levels of the same thing.
If you want to do a CPT (internship while your course is ongoing), you can just inform your school and it's fine. But if you want to do it after the course (OPT), you have to apply for an EAD, which adds another 3 months of delay. Why can't the attestation on your I-94 be enough?
It's like the USCIS creates additional paper work for itself so that it can cry about having too much work.
French education visas allow 20 or 25 hours of work per week built into the visa. But getting to stay after the education is complete is really hard for non-EU citizens.
If you have a master or licence professionnelle it's easy enough to stay, as long as you get a job offer for more than 40k€/year or so (which isn't that hard).
If you have a lower diploma than that and you don't want to study for a higher level in France, you can only stay if you get a job offer among a list of needed jobs in your region (IT-related jobs are needed in almost all regions). There's a lot of red tape, but it's not as difficult as it seems.
Then you get a heap of international students doing jobs that have typically been for local teenagers and the lower skilled, often with huge labor violation issues.
Unfortunately employment opportunity doesn't help in this case. They are already offered jobs/interns but cannot legally start working (anywhere) because they have to wait for the work permit (OPT) to be approved.
As someone who got his OPT extension before this cluster but still got his H1B rejected, it's safe to say I will highly discourage anyone I know from coming to the States for higher studies. Especially from India, since the Trump USCIS seems to have a special hatred towards Indians (because of outsourced workers abusing H1B? But that's not even the same people).
Till recently I felt guilty of the fact that every smart person I ever grew up knowing had emmigrated to the States and left India behind, but maybe this is a good thing for India now? Not sure yet.
The rumblings I've heard is that the administration is dragging its feet almost anywhere they can, wrt immigration.
It's not just H1Bs from India, but nearly all visas from all countries. Events that are supposed to take place in 6 weeks are at 6 months, and it doesn't seem to be documented or reported anywhere.
I've only heard about it through some friends going through it or otherwise involved in the processes.
It’s probably pretty difficult to square their anti immigration stance with their claim of being business friendly if you consider that most businesses love cheap immigrants. Hard to shape this into a coherent policy.
Immigrants are not necessarily cheap. H1B problems do bind some employees to their employers removing their leverage. I'm an immigrant, I can tell you I do not come cheap.
As mentioned, US immigration resources are being consumed by dealing with the flood of illegal immigrants at the southern border. Persons are being re-tasked to handle the asylum-claim processing and dealing with all of the unaccompanied minors.
It's hard to come by rigorous numbers. But RFE's (request for evidence) are now the routine (approx 70% of cases) in all immigration cases. I haven't even heard of an acquaintance having their immigration (H1B, OPT, L1, permanent residency) being approved without an RFE in recent times. RFE's used to be the exception rather (where the lawyer/applicant genuinely made a mistake) than the norm. Now it's the other way round. They find a minor technicality to issue an RFE.
Yes, but what about Indians in particular? I don't think it would be that hard to make a FOI request for the particular stats about that, so I'd like to know what led ramraj07 to believe that Indians are specifically targeted by USCIS, and specifically during the Trump administration. Presumably you could see that as a sharp line, marking a policy change, in the number of requests for evidence (your measurement) particularly for Indian applicants.
To me it seems reasonable that they determine their own criteria for triggering requests for evidence, but I've not heard about a particular policy or pattern for targeting Indian applicants.
I'm curious because similar claims have been made here in Canada as of recent; but it's hard to tell since we have a quite strict and inquisitive immigration system to begin with.
Late to reply, but there ARE numbers - need to find the timestamp but this lawyers talk shows the fraction of RFEs is significantly higher for Indian applicants in this lecture - https://youtu.be/i8nljUVzOiw
L. Francis Cissna was tremendously good at quietly making the legal system as hostile to immigrants as possible while technically staying within the confines of the law.
Trump likes showmanship over substance, though, so he's out. Guessing the new guy will keep the legal system slowdowns in place while upping the fireworks.
International students at Princeton do not exactly qualify as wretched refuse. Almost all are going to be paying full fees; they’re from rich families.
Do you think the truly destitute get better treatment at our hands?
Do you think those words are inscribed on the base of the statue of liberty as a warning to the wealthy? A "keep out!" sign for the hopeful and striving students of the world?
It's such weird revisionism to think that the US was ever really enthused about welcoming immigrants. That's the ideal, but the reality is that people are clannish and tend towards a "fuck you, got mine" attitude.
It's more like pledging a fraternity; pay the dues, get shit on, go through the hazing, and eventually you come out the other side assimilated and ready to haze the next incoming pledge class.
It's ideal but we shouldn't worry about being ideal because we weren't in the past, hmm? Well, I reject entirely the thesis that because humans "tend toward" tribalism or selfishness or any other flaw we must abandon ourselves to the worst excesses of those impulses.
We can, and should, be better. I think that starts with not giving up on our ideals so timidly.
1. USCIS has made the OPT process increasingly difficult as yo u can read from this article. However, OPT is the only option if you want to work in the US post graduation. Chances of getting an employer prior to graduation, who can file your H1 in April and wait for you to join in October is close to zero
2. H1 visa is a crapshoot lottery and if you are not a STEM student, you will most likely get one shot at it. If you are not picked, that's the end of it
3. Even if you get selected in H1, 70% of cases result in RFE for BS reasons that a hostile USCIS agent made up on the spot. H1 laws are so vague that a rogue USCIS officer can make up any reason to deny your petition.
4. Even if you get an approved H1 petition, it comes with a ton of strings attached. And if you travel out of the country you have to get a visa from your home country or Canada or Mexico. The visa process also been made extremely difficult, with routine delays and 3-6 months wait in many cases. Imagine being stuck abroad and having to let your employer know that they have to wait months before you can be back.
5. If you are an Indian student currently, the path to green card simply doesn't exist. There is a 100 year wait for a green card
6. Points #1-5 above are not bugs, but features. US education only makes sense for rich students, who want to study for a few years and return. But then, why would you want to study in the US and deal with the harassment in US consulates and embassies to get an F-1 visa or deal with hostile CBP agents who treat you like enemies after flying for 40 hours.