Relief for Indian IT professionals as US Senate passes High-Skilled Immigrants Act

Washington DC: The United States Senate passed the `Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act` or S.386 bill on Wednesday evening, proving a huge relief to thousands of Indian nationals currently stuck in Green Card limbo.

The bill aims to do away with the country caps on employment-based green cards. The bill essentially will increases the per-country cap on family-based immigrant visas from the current 7 per cent of the total number of such visas available in a particular year to 15 per cent.

At present, the US issues 140,000 of these green cards annually.

There are over 800,000 Indians in line for an employment-based green card as of April 2020 as per US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) data.

While the S386 Bill had earlier been cleared by the House of Representatives (Fairness for High-Skilled Workers Act HR 1044), the version passed by the Senate has is different from the previous one.

The representatives of the two houses will have to resolve the differences and reconcile it, and only then will it be passed by both Houses. The final nod to the bill has to come from President Donald Trump.

So far, the White House hasn`t given any indication about whether the president will sign the bill or veto it.