USCIS
other on 3 shows · 10 statements across 3 episodes
Sourcery 
the a16z Podcast 
TBPN
10 statements about USCIS, every show
Wen: There is no cap on US O-1 extraordinary ability visas
“There's no cap to it. As long as you meet their bar for and convince USCIS that you're extraordinary, you can get it.”
Only 10,000 people apply for O-1 visas annually, mostly non-STEM talent
“Right now there are 10,000 people who apply roughly every year and only less than half of them are what you would call stem talent, like individuals with technical degrees.”
Kim: USCIS premium processing guarantees O-1 visa decisions in 15 days
“Depending on the visa category, so for like something like an O, you pay, you know, a couple thousand dollars to the, to USCIS, and it means you are guaranteed an outcome within 15 calendar days.”
Ting Ni: 75% of immigration agencies stay open during federal shutdowns
“75% of the agencies and programs that deal with immigration remain open, and that's because USCIS and Department of State, these are agencies that run on the fees that they collect from the application, so they are not appropriated Fees by the federal governme…”
Ni: USCIS H-1B Request for Evidence rates jumped to 68.9% in 2017
“In Q-III, for all the H-I-Bs that were filed, 22.5% received RFE's. It's a little bit higher than the Q-II and the Q-I figures of 13.5 and 17.3% respectively, But it's still within the realm of reason. Fast forward to Q-IV, when everything kind of started happ…”
Ni: USCIS Googles startups to verify H-1B filings match public postings
“Because USCIS do Google companies and confirm whether what you're submitting matches with what you're putting out there to make sure that you're putting the right thing out there from the get-go.”
Ni: Filing H-1Bs under computer programmer SOC code risks RFE or denial
“So if you file an application with a computer programmer code instead of a software engineer code, you're very much going to get an RFE, if not a denial.”
Ni: USCIS logic equating Level 1 wages to non-specialty occupations is faulty
“The first USCIS challenge we see in the wage level category is this idea that Because an H-I-B position has a level one wage, it's not a specialty occupation, meaning any entry level position is by default not a specialty occupation, which is really faulty log…”
Ni: Level 1 wages for equity-heavy senior startup roles trigger USCIS issues
“So, you know, you have a very senior role with very senior job duties, but because you're a startup and you're, you know, kind of paying people more in equity you only, you can only have a wage level One salary. So for that reason, you choose a level one wage.…”
Pretorius: USCIS likely to suspend H-1B cap premium processing again
“I think it's pretty safe to say for actual cap, based on what they've done the last two years, it's probably likely there's going to be some suspend, some suspension of that, whether it's before or they announce it right after, you know, cap season kicks off, …”