Thread: Legal immigrants mobilize to lobby Congress

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/n ... ncard.html

Legal immigrants mobilize to lobby Congress
They want green cards issued faster for highly skilled engineers and scientists.
By Steven Kreytak
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Monday, May 08, 2006

Nilesh Khare loves his job as an Austin software engineer, but his wife, Ashwini, says the Indian couple may soon give up on its American dream.

The Khares and their young children are in the United States on Nilesh's employer-sponsored H1B visa for highly skilled workers, which allows them to stay in the country temporarily. In 2002, he applied for an employment-based green card so they could become permanent U.S. residents.

But government backlogs and quotas have left the Khares, both 33, waiting with about 500,000 others for employer-based green card approval. Without green cards, the immigrants can't change jobs or get promoted. And their spouses usually can't work — a major frustration for Ashwini Khare, who is an environmental engineer but is in the country as a dependent of her husband.

Driven by their frustration with what they call a broken American legal immigration system, the Khares, who live in Northwest Austin, are among thousands of highly skilled, legal immigrants across the country who have banded together to ask Congress to shorten the estimated six- to nine-year wait for a green card.

Earlier this year, some of the workers, most of whom hold H1B work visas or corresponding visas for dependents, founded the nonprofit Immigration Voice, which now counts more than 3,000 members, most of them immigrants from India. The group has raised more than $100,000 to spread its message and has hired a Washington lobbying firm to take it to members of Congress — a different approach from the large street protests staged by illegal immigrants and their supporters in recent months.

Ashwini Khare says that if the green card backlog is not alleviated soon, her family and others may return home or to other countries whose immigration systems are stream- lined.

"Every year it's been one more year and one more year, and six years have passed," she said. "I just cannot sit at home forever."

It's the U.S. economy, which experts say doesn't produce enough math, engineering and science graduates to meet employers' needs, that will suffer if people like the Khares leave, say advocates for the highly skilled set, including Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas.

"There's simply a lack of people with the skills necessary for these high-end, high-wage jobs," Cornyn said. "The way we are going to maintain or improve our level of prosperity for the next generation and beyond is being the innovators."

Cornyn last week filed a bill that aims to alleviate the wait for green cards by raising the annual cap on employment-based green cards from 140,000 to 290,000.With more people issued green cards annually, the wait for one would get shorter, the immigrants think.

The Securing Knowledge, Innovation and Leadership bill would also free up some green cards by not counting certain immigrants against the annual cap: those with advanced degrees from U.S. universities, workers of "extraordinary ability," and outstanding researchers and professors, according to a summary of Cornyn's legislation.About 80,000 foreign students are now in the United States, Cornyn estimates. They also need an employer to sponsor them to qualify for permanent residency.

Cornyn's proposal and two other measures with similar provisions in the Senate also call for an increase in the number of H1Bs issued annually. Under Cornyn's plan, the cap would increase from 65,000 to 115,000.

After Cornyn's legislation was filed, U.S. Semiconductor Industry Association President George Scalise praised it as a way to "address our critical shortage of scientists and engineers."

The legal immigrants in the nation's green card queue want to distance themselves from the debate about how to treat the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the country, which has dominated headlines and debate on Capitol Hill, said Pratik Dakwala, a San Jose, Calif.-based business consultant from India waiting for a green card.

He wants Americans to know that "we also have people who have come through legal channels. They are stuck. Nothing is being done for them," said Dakwala, a member of the core group of volunteers at Immigration Voice.

The group began as a loose collection of legal immigrants at employers across the country who would vent their frustrations on the Web site of a New York immigration lawyer; they sometimes refer to themselves online as "H1Bs."

In December, a proposal aimed at shortening the wait for a green card was dropped from legislation by a House-Senate conference committee, even after the immigrants had showered members of Congress with e-mails and faxes supporting it.

That disappointment led them to found Immigration Voice.

The Khares know their skills are needed and want to stay in Austin, drawn by the schools that encourage freedom and creativity in their children and by Nilesh's job. (He declined to disclose the name of his employer for fear of retribution.)

The family has followed the rules, paid taxes and contributed to local charities and now wants security — to buy a house and contribute to a 401(k).

And Ashwini Khare can't wait to start working.

"It's amazing," she said. "I really do not have any more patience now."

skreytak@statesman.com; 912-2946

It's about time, this is something we have needed for a long time, for people like these to get in the faces of our congress leaders and let them have it with their unfair immigration practices! Bully for them, I will be rooting for them when they go, and hope they get the same media attention as the illegal protesters did in the streets.