Over the past several days, immigrant visa applicants around the world have reported that their long-awaited consular interviews were cancelled or postponed often with little notice and no new date. The cancellations are not isolated to one embassy or one region. According to reporting by The New York Times on August 24, 2026, the U.S....
Blog
Aug242026
On August 25, 2026, the Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that would impose a $103,265 fee on H-1B cap-subject petitions. The timing is not a coincidence. It comes one month after the First Circuit refused to let the government reinstate the $100,000 fee created by last September’s presidential...
On August 21, 2026, a federal judge in New York struck down the Department of State policy that had implemented the 75-country immigrant visa pause. The pause was originally announced in mid-January 2026 and allowed for Applicants to attend their consular interviews but barred consular officers from issuing immigrant visas. The Administration justified the decision...
Aug212026
Snapshot: USCIS has released a policy memo providing guidance regarding the new public charge rule that will be implemented on September 18, 2026 Your filing date will determine if the new rule applies to you Any benefits received before September 18 mostly will not count, do not drop coverage in a panic After September 18,...
I’ve been telling people this for a while now: if you own your own company and want to sponsor yourself for an H-1B through it, you do not need a board of directors. No investors. No outside corporate governance. None of it. I’ve said it enough times that people started asking me if I was...
On August 18, 2026, a coalition of university groups and labor unions filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts to block the rule ending duration of status that I wrote about last month. They filed a motion for a preliminary injunction along with the complaint. The lawsuit claims that DHS...
On July 17, 2026, DHS published a final rule ending duration of status for F-1 students, replacing it with a fixed admission period capped at four years. I wrote about what that means for Day 1 CPT here. Less than a month later, on August 12, 2026, SEVP issued Broadcast Message BCM 2608-01, “Reminder of...
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...