US postpones termination of H4 visas till June

NewsBharati    04-Mar-2018
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Washington, March 4: Partners and families of H-1B visa holders can heave a sigh of relief now as the Trump administration has postponed its decision on the termination of work authorization for the spouses of the H-1B visa holders.

 

The United States (US) Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has decided to defer the roll-out of the proposal that could bar spouses of H-1B visa holders from seeking employment in the country. It adds that the date for issuing the draft proposal has been deferred to June from its earlier target of February 2018.

H-4 visa holders are spouses of H1-B visa holders and received work authorization in 2015 during the Obama administration. It is mostly Indian and Chinese women who benefit from this. Since the H-1B visa program was introduced in May 2015, more than one lakh employment authorization documents had been issued to eligible spouses of the visa holder and Indians constitute a large chunk of it.

Since 2015, the spouses of H-1B visa holders are granted an H4 visa in the US. H4 visa holders are not entitled to work or carry on their own business unless they obtained an employment authorization document (EAD).

In January 2018, US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that the government was not allowing any proposal that would force H-1B visa holders to leave the country. The organization has filed a lawsuit against the decision of the previous Obama Administration to give work authorization to the spouses of H-1B visa workers whose Green card applications have been approved.

An online petition has been launched urging the Congress not to cancel work authorization of H-4 visas.