September 26, 2011   

Contact: Frances Cox, The Fratelli Group, 202-822-9491                                                                           

 

ACIP Commends Bill to End Employment-based Green Card Per-country Limits & Urges Congress to Make More Green Cards Available

 

Washington, D.C. – The American Council on International Personnel (ACIP) today released the following statement in support of the Fairness for High Skilled Immigrants Act (H.R. 3012), introduced by Representative Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) and co-sponsored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX):

 

We thank the bill’s sponsor Congressman Chaffetz and its co-sponsor Chairman Smith for introducing legislation that would eliminate the employment-based green card per-country limits, shortening wait times for a number of highly educated professionals from high-demand countries and gradually equalizing wait times for all countries.

 

Long waits only discourage innovators and the best and brightest from staying in America and contributing to U.S. job creation and economic growth. This bill would abolish the quotas over the course of three years, giving employers time to adjust and plan for their business needs in the new first come, first served system.

 

We believe the bill is a step in the right direction and we continue to urge Congress to work toward fully clearing our green card backlogs – something that ultimately only Congress can do by issuing more green card visa numbers. 

 

We encourage Congress to act on this bill and move forward this year on other critical fixes to the employment-based green card system.

 

To learn more about the importance of reforming the employment-based green card system, see ACIP’s primer or www.acip.com.