Week of April 8–14, 2022

The UK's Scale-Up visa is a route for businesses to recruit foreign nationals who have the skills needed to help the business grow. It offers benefits such as exemption from the Immigration Skills Charge and a route to settlement in the UK. To become a Scale-Up sponsor, a business must have demonstrated an annual turnover and/or employee growth rate of at least 20% for the preceding three-year period, with a minimum of 10 employees at the beginning of the period. To qualify for the visa, an applicant must be at least 18 years old, have a job at an appropriate skill level, a salary of at least £33,000 per annum, and an English language ability at level B1. Successful applicants can bring dependent family members with them. The visa is a five-year route to settlement, with two stages.

A US appeals court has ruled that federal agencies were correct in withholding documents relating to their vetting of immigration applicants to uncover possible terrorist connections. A panel of judges for the Second Circuit Court of Appeals said that sections of a Department of State field manual on reviewing visa applications, and model questions for US Citizenship and Immigration Services, were created for law enforcement purposes and therefore exempt from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act. The decision overturned a previous ruling that the documents should be made public. The Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University had sued for access to the documents in 2017, arguing that the agencies’ policies excluded individuals based on their speech, beliefs, or associations.

US President Joe Biden's decision to rescind the Title 42 policy, which stopped people crossing the southern US border because of Covid-19, has angered Republican lawmakers and divided Democrats in the run-up to November's midterm elections. Some Democratic senators with marginal seats criticised the move, while business groups have pushed for more liberal immigration rules to help ease labour shortages. The US Chamber of Commerce estimates there are 4.75 million more jobs than people looking for work, and argues that lower legal immigration is part of the reason. Despite the pushback, the Biden administration still intends to bring in rules requiring higher wages for overseas workers using H-1B visas, aimed at preventing foreigners undercutting potential US hires.

Tijuana now hosting over 2,000 Ukranians hoping to be granted entry to United States

As the Russian invasion of Ukraine continues, over 2,000 Ukrainian refugees have arrived at the Mexican side of California's southern border in the past 10 days. Many have travelled to Tijuana in the hope of gaining entry into the US, with some waiting days to be allowed in, leading to a backlog and confusion. Volunteers from across the state are trying to provide shelter, food, and other assistance to refugees. President Joe Biden announced last month that the US would accept 100,000 Ukrainian refugees, but details of the program have not been released, prompting some refugees to seek entry more quickly. Ukrainians who can afford the journey are travelling to Mexico, a country they can enter without a visa, to try to seek asylum in the US, a country they cannot. The war in Ukraine has resulted in roughly 4.3 million Ukrainians fleeing their country, with many seeking refuge in Poland, Romania, or other nearby European nations.

A backlog in immigration applications is causing delays for some immigrants in Arizona. Applications for green card renewals and citizenship that were filed in 2020 are still pending, according to immigration attorney Ayensa Millan. The US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) experienced office closures and staffing shortages during the pandemic, which put applications on hold. The backlog has caused problems for people with expired work permits and green cards, Millan said. USCIS announced plans last month to reduce the backlog, including allowing more applicants to pay extra to expedite their petitions, increasing capacity, improving technology and expanding staffing. USCIS Director Ur Jaddou said the agency remained committed to delivering timely and fair decisions to all those it serves.

Oregon's recently-formed state Office of Immigrant and Refugee Advancement will coordinate work already being done across the state for immigrants and refugees by government and non-profits. The office is tasked with creating new policies, securing more federal funding for the state’s immigrants and refugee organisations and, most importantly to Director Toc Soneoulay-Gillespie, prioritising education between service agencies and refugee and immigrant recipients. Soneoulay-Gillespie hopes her office becomes the seat at the legislative table for immigrants and refugees in the state, and that she can help state leaders keep immigrants and refugees front of mind as they craft policies for the future.

The Athens United Immigrant Support Project (AUISP) is a non-profit organisation in Ohio that supports immigrant rights by providing resources, support, and sponsorship to help immigrants settle into their new lives. AUISP also provides financial assistance, and local volunteers are on hand to offer housing and friendship to newcomers, who are often seeking asylum in the US. Since it began, AUISP has sponsored more than 20 people and offers help to those from all over the world, not just Spanish-speaking countries, as originally envisioned. The group was founded by Zach Reizes, who had visited the US-Mexico border and seen first-hand the difficulties and time required to gain entry to the US. Despite some recent immigration reform in the US, AUISP continues to provide vital support to new immigrants, and its volunteers are committed to ongoing engagement with newcomers, many of whom have become part of their extended families.

Republican candidates in several US states, including Ohio, Nevada, and New Mexico, are using anti-immigrant rhetoric in an attempt to appeal to white voters aligned with former President Trump. Such messaging is aimed at the GOP primaries, but some Republican Party figures warn it could alienate crucial Latino swing voters in November. Nevada Republican Senate candidate Adam Laxalt has spent $13,000 on radio ads in Elko and Las Vegas touting his opposition to protections for immigrants brought to the country as children, while Ohio GOP Senate candidate J.D. Vance asked voters in a TV ad whether they were racist and said President Biden supported “open borders” (he does not). New Mexico GOP gubernatorial candidate Rebecca Dow released a video of herself riding a horse along the US-Mexico border while promising to fight “radical socialists”.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, filmmaker and immigration advocate Jose Antonio Vargas spoke at Illinois State University’s Asian Cultural Dinner, calling for greater understanding of undocumented immigrants. Vargas stressed the importance of changing the misleading narratives surrounding immigration in the media and said that “immigration is the most talked about and least understood issue with the American public”. Vargas, who was born in the Philippines and arrived in the US at 12 years old, is himself an undocumented immigrant. He founded the non-profit media advocacy organisation Define American to help promote more nuanced narratives of immigrants in film and television, saying that the entertainment industry often lacked knowledge of immigration processes. Vargas also described the challenges he faced in his own efforts to become a citizen and called for immigration reform.

A US appeals court has permitted the Biden administration to execute a policy focusing immigration enforcement on people convicted of serious crimes while it appeals a judge's order that had blocked the policy nationwide. The decision has overturned a ruling from a federal judge in Dayton, Ohio who had issued a nationwide injunction that stopped the guidance from being implemented. In a November complaint, Ohio, Arizona and Montana claimed that the US Department of Homeland Security could not pick and choose which types of convicted criminals to detain. They argued that detaining fewer people who are in the US illegally would threaten public safety and impose costs on states for law enforcement and public services. The DHS memo instructed immigration officers to prioritize arresting and detaining individuals facing deportation who pose a threat to national security or have been convicted of aggravated felonies.