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1 St. John's J. Int'l & Comp. L. 1 (2011)

handle is hein.journals/sjjicl1 and id is 1 raw text is: TOWARDS COMPREHENSIVE IMMIGRATION REFORM: A CONSENSUS WITHIN EMERGING TRENDS Mark R. von Sternberg * I will begin not by describing the proposed solution, but by describing the problem. Clients come to Catholic Charities each Thursday. Countless times, we have to advise them that they have no remedies. Even if the alien has a potentially petitioning family member, a solution to the need for family unification may prove elusive: the alien may not be able to adjust status and may be naturally reluctant to proceed to a consular interview because of concerns about the three- and ten-year bars. Or the alien may be a preference immigrant having a priority date which is simply many years from becoming current.2 Each of these situations is not uncommon and has resulted in long delays which run counter to the stated policy of family unity. A more dramatic problem confronts workers in the U.S. occupying less that skilled positions which U.S. workers do not wish to fill. Because realistic immigrant and non-immigrant visas are largely lacking for this class,3 these non-citizens constitute the largest human aggregate in need of Senior Attorney with Catholic Charities Community Services; adjunct professor, St. John's University School of Law. J.D., Vanderbilt University Law School, 1973; LL.M., New York University School of Law, 1984. 1 See, e.g., section 212(a)(9)(B) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(9)(B) (2010), making inadmissible for a three- and ten-year period aliens who remain in the United States in unlawful presence for in excess 180 days or one year respectively. Importantly, the three- and ten-year bars are not triggered until the alien actually leaves the United States. 2 Aliens qualifying under a preference category (e.g., as the sons and daughters of lawful permanent residents), as opposed to qualifying as immediate relatives, are subject to a waiting period. See, e.g., INA §§ 202-203, 8 U.S.C. §§ 1152-1153 (2010), setting forth per country and worldwide caps on annual immigration to the United States. 3 The most widely used non-immigrant visa employed by aliens seeking to come to the United States temporarily to work is the H-1B, available to non-citizens qualifying as Specialty Occupation non-immigrants. The coverage of this category relates essentially to professional workers, i.e., those needing the equivalent of a U.S. baccalaureate degree to perform the job they are coming here to fill. The visa category covering non-immigrants

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