Healthcare Blog

The House and Senate get back to Washington DC on Tuesday, December 5. This will be the final session for the Lame Duck period. Depending on how much progress they are making, the session could last for just a few days or continue for most of the month. Here are a few rumors that we at Hammond Law Group are hearing could happen during the Lame Duck.

1. The AHA and others still are pushing for the SKIL Bill. Some have pegged our chances of getting a Lame Duck SKIL Bill at 50-50.

2. Others tell us that some Congressmen are advocating a 12,000-15,000 visa allotment for Schedule A visas. This would be a band-aid measure designed to get us visas until a CIR-type bill could be passed in spring/summer 2007.

3. Some GOP members do not want any appropriations measures – including the 12,000-15,000 band-aid or a more robust SKIL Bill – attached to any appropriations bill. In other words, they want to pass a Continuing Resolution (CR) and then they just want to go home. The CR effectively extends the funding for the Iraq War into the New Year and then lets the next Congress deal with it.

The Coalition to Improve Healthcare Staffing has drafted a sign-on letter for employers of foreign-trained healthcare workers. The CTIHS, of which Hammond Law Group is a member, is actively asking its constituents to add their name to the letter. The letter will be sent to Congressmen and Senators next week. You can read the letter at the CTIHS’ website.

The American Hospital Association has formally signed Compete America’s request that Congress enact the SKIL Bill during the lame duck session. Compete America’s stakeholders include a wide-range of large well-known organizations, inlcuding: eBay, duPont, AILA, Exxon Mobil, Cisco, and Microsoft.

There has been some talk in our Comments section about the SKIL Bill. It remains the best hope for people seeking an elimination of retrogression for Schedule A workers — registered nurses and physcial therapists.

Here is a quick summary so that everyone can familiarize themselves:

1. Market based H1 cap AND no cap for US Masters H1s. The H1 cap can increase as much as 20% per each successive year.
2. No Schedule A Immigrant visa (IV) quota — forever
3. Doubles the IV ( aka green card) numbers
4. No IV quota for US Masters degree holders.
5. Creates a “streamlined process” for employers of IVs so that they shouldn’t have to, for instance, keep answering an “ability to pay” RFE over and over again.
6. Premium processing of I-140s.
7. Eliminates SWA’s processing of PERM PWDs by making the function a national one AND mandates that the PWD must be issued within 20 days.
8. Re-institutes the in-country visa revalidation, which was eliminated in 2003, which eliminates the hurdle in revalidating H-1 visas.

Here is our previous posting, which also includes a link to the actual language of the bill.

The results are in and the Democrats have taken the House and will likely take the Senate (the Virginia Senate race is still too close to call, but the Democrat is ahead). This will surely mean good things for Comprehensive Immigration Reform and for Schedule A relief. It is still too early to specifically say what will happen, but the odds have dramatically improved. There is already talk of a Schedule A lame duck bill being offered in the next few weeks. Stay tuned….

On November 1, 2006, the Department of State enacted retrogression for Schedule A nurses and physical therapists. In response to a number of inquiries that HLG has had, we are offering this Retrogression FAQ. Please feel free to distribute it to your employees, friends, and colleagues. Let us know if you find it helpful. If you have any other questions of a general nature, please post them in the comments section. Periodically we’ll check back and answer the questions.

Immigration2006.org is an interesting blog/news site that discusses how the immigration issue is shaping next week’s election. The site is written by several long-time Washington DC insiders.