I-Squared Act is Bi-Partisan Effort to Improve Immigration of High-Technology Workers

In recent weeks, much has been reported in the media concerning comprehensive immigration reform. Many people tend to focus on the estimated 11 million undocumented persons in the United States.  But of equal importance to our economy and our international competitiveness is the need to improve and increase the immigration of highly skilled technology workers to the United States.

On January 29, 2013, a bi-partisan group of Senators introduced Senate Bill 169, the “Immigration Innovation Act of 2013 (I-Squared Act)” an important bill that would vastly reform and improve the immigration system for high-technology workers. For years, antiquated U.S. immigration law has impeded the natural migration of high-technology workers, many of whom have been educated in the United States. Many economists and some politicians, across the ideological spectrum, have advocated for increased and eased entry of foreign high-technology workers. Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) workers help to propel and sustain technology innovation and development. Many foreign-born STEM workers are among the most successful U.S. entrepreneurs. In short, it is now widely recognized that foreign-born STEM workers do not displace U.S. workers, rather they help create and grow U.S. jobs.

The I-Squared Act would improve and increase numbers of both temporary (nonimmigrant) and permanent immigration to the United States.

 In the area of permanent (green card) immigration: I-Squared provides for the recapture and use of employment-based green cards that were not used in previous years; it would exempt dependents of employment-based green card recipients, U.S. STEM advance degree graduates,  persons of extraordinary ability, and outstanding professors and researchers from the 140,000 annual cap. The law would provide for the roll-over of unused employment-based green cards to the following fiscal year so as to avoid the need to recapture these in the future, and it would eliminate the annual per-country limits for employment-based green cards and raise per-country caps for family-based green cards.

In the area of H-1B (temporary high-skilled workers requiring at least a bachelor’s degree): The proposed I-Squared law would increase the H-1B annual numerical limitation from 65,000 to 115,000, and it would establish a market-based H-1B escalator, that would adjust up or down to the demands of the economy. The law would uncap the existing U.S. advanced degree cap exemption (there is currently a cap exemption for the first 20,000 U.S. advanced degree holders per year), and it would authorize employment for dependent spouses of H-1B visa holders.

I-Squared would also unburden F-1 foreign students by providing for “dual intent”, i.e. the intent to study temporarily in the U.S., while also pursuing lawful permanent immigration. The “un-abandoned residence” requirement has long hampered and discouraged foreign students who wish to enter the U.S. to study.

Based on our years of representation of high-tech workers and their employers, we instinctively know that there is an enormous amount of pent-up entrepreneurial and innovation energy that lies untapped within the high-skilled immigrant population in the U.S. If I-Squared is enacted, we believe this country will experience a palpable burst of economic and technological advancement. Let’s do more than keep our fingers crossed. We urge everyone to contact their congressmen and senators to urge passage of the bi-partisan “Immigration Innovation Act of 2013”.