MORE INFORMATION :
For Immediate Release.
Immigration Voice To Organize A Peaceful Rally Of Legal, Skilled
Foreign Professionals In Washington D.C.
Immigration Voice (http://www.immigrationvoice.org), a grass-roots
advocacy group of highly skilled legal immigrants is organizing a
rally of skilled workers in Washington D.C. on Tuesday, September
18th, 2007 to draw the attention of US lawmakers and the American
public toward the excessive delays and backlogs in the Employment
Based Immigration system.
Thousands of skilled, legal professionals, such as Doctors, Engineers,
Scientists, MBAs and other professionals from all over the country are
expected to participate in this unprecedented rally in the nation's
capital. With this rally, they hope to impress upon the Congress the
urgency and the necessity for reform in the Employment Based
Immigration System.
Rally Schedule
9 AM: Registration begins at the North East Quadrant of the Washington
Monument for rally participants.
11:30 AM: Rally starts for Capitol Building through Constitution Ave
1:00 PM: Rally reaches the Capitol Building. Addressed by the US
lawmakers
The Need For Reform
Nearly half a million highly skilled foreign workers are stuck in the
backlog for Employment Based permanent residency (Green Cards). Today,
this system takes anywhere between 6 and 12 years to grant the Green
Card. This delay in obtaining permanent residency is due to two
reasons:
1.
Low numerical cap (only 140,000 out of a total of 1.2 million
Green Cards awarded annually).
2.
Processing delays in adjudication of applications.
A Grassroots Effort
This rally, and the organization, Immigration Voice, is a grass-roots
effort propelled by the hard work and enthusiasm of thousands of
skilled immigrants who have come to the US from all over the world but
now want to call this country their home.
One of them is Kannan Sundaramahalingam, an engineer who works in
Alparetta, GA. Kannan says that he wants to join this rally because
"for years we legal immigrants were silent sufferers of this complex
immigration process. Now there is a chance to make a difference and
don't want to miss it".
Vivek Gupta, also a member of Immigration Voice is a professor of
Radiology at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, FL. He wants to
participate in the rally to ensure that "the voice of the highly-
skilled and educated legal immigrants is heard and paid attention to".
Will The US Lawmakers Act Before It Is Too Late?
The question here is if the US lawmakers and the immigration
bureaucracy will pay attention to the demands of a fair treatment by
the skilled, legal immigrants or will they wait until it is too late?
According to a recently published study by researchers from Harvard,
Duke and New York universities, if steps to alleviate the backlog of
green cards are not taken soon , the US faces a very real prospect of
"reverse brain-drain". This report can be found at http://www.globalizationresearch.com.
The current backlog and the lack of concern shown by the US Congress
towards skilled, legal professionals is disheartening because these
professionals played by the rules, entered this country legally, have
used the most productive years of their lives in enriching this
country and yet, the entire immigration process is hopelessly mired in
inefficiencies, lack of transparency and mind-boggling delays.
With this rally, Immigration Voice would like to bring to the
attention of the lawmakers that:
1.
The low numerical cap for the Employment Based Green Card
category is inadequate to meet the requirements of American employers.
2.
The per-country limit for the Employment Based Immigration
category is not reasonable. The employment based immigration is driven
by petitions filed by employers that want to retain their employee
based on skills, knowledge, education and talent: The country of birth
has nothing to do with employability.
3.
The delays in obtaining a Green Card are resulting in
disillusionment and anxiety to these future Americans; so much so that
many have either already left or are considering leaving the United
States.
4.
If a solution is not found soon, the resulting "reverse brain
drain" will exacerbate the effects of overseas outsourcing on the
American economy.
Media Contact
This rally is being organized by Immigration Voice, an advocacy group
representing skilled, legal professionals from all countries in the
US. For more information, please send an email to
media@immigrationvoice.org or contact Immigration Voice's media
coordinator, Rupa Narayan, at 480-964-3011.
About Immigration Voice
Immigration Voice is a non-profit organization (501 (c) (4)) working
to alleviate the problems faced by legal high-skilled foreign workers
in the United States. For more information please visit:
http://www.immigrationvoice.org.
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