Why people don't sign up
Why don't all the people who came to this country illegally just sign up to become U.S. workers and citizens?
It's a simple question. The answer is complex. Let's say an Oklahoma City restaurant owner has a great cook working for him who slipped into this country illegally from Mexico five years ago. The owner would like to keep the cook, so he decides to sponsor him for a work permit, also known as a green card, under employment-based immigration law. The first obstacle may be cost. Immigration filing fees tripled on July 30, said T. Douglas Stump, an immigration attorney with more than 24 years experience who practices in Oklahoma City and Tulsa. The filing fee for an employer-sponsored green card is now $1,485, Stump said. Attorney fees and other costs may add $5,000 or so to that cost, said Vance Winningham, another Oklahoma City immigration attorney with about 35 years of experience. That can be an obstacle, but it's not the biggest one, Stump said. The U.S. only grants 140,000 employment-based permits a year, and that includes spouses and children, he said. Preference categories favor highly skilled doctors, researchers, people with master's degrees and the like. And only 7.1 percent of the permits can be granted to persons from any specific country, Stump said. There is a huge backlog of applicants. So, even if the employer can show there is a shortage of U.S. workers available to fill a cook's job, there is still a 6 year wait just to get a green card for Hispanics from Mexico, Stump said. But it gets worse. "Under U.S. immigration laws, if you entered the country illegally, you can't get a green card here,” Stump said. "You have to go back to your home country.” And, under a 1996 law, if a person leaves the country after having been in the U.
Related Topics:
Social Issues, Hispanic and Latino Issues, Immigration, Illegal Immigration and Deportation, Citizenship and Naturalization, Government and Politics
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