On October 14, 2026, the Department of Homeland Security published a final rule permanently ending the automatic extension of most Employment Authorization Documents (EADs). If your renewal is still pending when your card expires, you may have to stop working until USCIS approves it. Here is what changed, who is affected, and what you can...
H-1B Specialty Occupation & H-4 Dependent visas
Since January 17, 2025, a foreign national who owns a controlling interest in a U.S. company can be the beneficiary of an H-1B petition filed by that company. We secured our first H-1B self-petition approval in 2025 and have been filing these cases since. The same questions come up in nearly every consultation, so I’ve...
When USCIS processing runs long, an H-1B employee’s I-94 can expire while their petition is still pending. In many cases, the employee can keep working legally during that wait, but the employer has to update Form I-9 correctly to show it. The rules depend on what kind of H-1B petition you filed. Below, we walk...
Last October I wrote about the Supreme Court declining to hear Save Jobs USA v. DHS, and I said at the time that the decision did nothing to stop a future administration from revisiting the program through new regulatory action. That is exactly what is now happening. DHS has placed a rule on the Unified...
A rule effective January 17, 2025, changed what’s possible for entrepreneurs and business owners pursuing an H-1B visa. It allows H-1B beneficiaries to self-petition even when they hold a controlling interest in the petitioning entity. For founders and beneficiary-owned businesses, that opened a real path forward. But this path comes with specific documentation requirements. This...
Just when employers thought they had a handle on the $100,000 H-1B fee, the litigation took another turn. On July 24, 2026, the First Circuit Court of Appeals declined to let the government reinstate the fee while its appeal plays out. A quick recap We’ve been tracking this fee since before it even took effect....
In a long-awaited decision, a federal judge has declared the Trump administration’s attempt to impose a $100k fee on certain H-1B workers to be unlawful. Last September, the immigration community was shell-shocked when the Trump administration announced a $100k fee applicable to certain H-1B workers. Practitioners, employers, and employees initially scrambled to understand what the...
H-1B Wage Compliance, Benching, Unpaid Leave and the Cost of Getting It Wrong By Chris Prescott | PSBP Law | April 29, 2026 Most companies that sponsor H-1B workers think of the Labor Condition Application (“LCA”) as a piece of paperwork. They sign it, post it, file it with USCIS, and move on. Then a...