Immigration Law Review - UK and USA

Parties    1) Plaintiffs: Dr. Zahra Shokri Varniab and Dr. Ashkan Pourabhari Langroudi, married medical doctors from Iran.      2) Defendants:         • Joseph B. Edlow, Director of USCIS         • Kristi Noem, Secretary of Homeland Security         • Pamela Bondi, Attorney General of the United States Facts    Plaintiffs filed suit in the Northern District of California on 11 December 2025 seeking to compel USCIS to adjudicate their pending applications for adjustment of status (I ‑ 485) and employment authorization (I ‑ 765). They subsequently moved for a preliminary injunction. Plaintiffs are graduates of Tehran University of Medical Sciences and previously practiced medicine in Iran. They entered the United States lawfully on J ‑ 1 (principal) and J ‑ 2 (dependent) visas on 6 March 2023.   Dr. Varniab works as a postdoctoral research fello...

  A “visa brake” has come into force in the UK from 12:01 a.m. on 26 March 2026. This visa brake requires the refusal of: 1. any Student visa application made from outside the UK by nationals of Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar or Sudan; and any Skilled Worker visa application made from outside the UK by Afghan nationals. The practical impact of this visa brake is that: a. UK employers cannot now sponsor new Skilled Worker entrants from Afghanistan applying from overseas, even where a valid CoS has already been issued; and b. The student‑visa brake for four nationalities will reduce the future pipeline of graduates from those countries available for UK graduate‑to‑work or Skilled Worker transitions. Legal Basis The “visa brake” taking effect on 26 March 2026 does not have its own stand‑alone Act of Parliament. Its legal basis is as follows: Under section 3(2) of the Immigration Act 1971, the Secretary of State has power to make and vary Immigration Rules governing the...

Mr. ABC is a scientist working for a pharmaceutical company in India. He has a PhD in Biochemistry a Tier 1 Indian University (“T 1 IU”). He has been working for a leading Indian Pharmaceutical Company (“Pharma Co”) for the past 15 years and has 3 patents in his name. Mr. ABC wants to apply for an EB-1 immigrant visa on his own, without using an immigration attorney. How should Mr. ABC go about filing his application? 1. Understand the EB‑1A legal standard and criteria Go to the official USCIS EB‑1A page and read: Who qualifies as having “extraordinary ability in the sciences” The 10 regulatory criteria (major award, membership, publications, citations, judging, original contributions, authorship, leading role, high salary, commercial success). 2. Map your profile to specific EB‑1A criteria List all achievements: Degrees (M.Sc., PhD from T 1 IU) 15 years at Pharma Co (positions, promotions, leadership) 3 ...

 Italy’s long-standing citizenship regime, governed primarily by Law No. 91 of 1992, has traditionally followed the principle of ius sanguinis (citizenship by descent) with no generational limit. As long as the chain of transmission was unbroken and citizenship was not renounced, descendants born abroad could claim Italian citizenship indefinitely. This system, rooted in the 1865 Civil Code and reinforced in 1912 and 1992, created one of the most expansive diaspora citizenship frameworks in Europe. In response to a massive surge in applications—particularly from Latin America (e.g., Argentina and Brazil reported tens of thousands of new claims in 2024–2025), overwhelming consulates, municipal registries, and courts—the government issued Decree-Law No. 36 on 28 March 2025. This emergency measure was later converted, with modifications, into Law No. 74/2025. The core innovation is the insertion of Article 3-bis into Law 91/1992. It provides that a person born abroad who holds anot...

  The case, Amica Center for Immigrant Rights et al. v. Executive Office for Immigration Review et al. , was filed on February 26, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The plaintiffs consist of five nonprofit legal services organizations—Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, Brooklyn Defender Services, Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project, HIAS, and National Immigrant Justice Center—that provide representation, advice, and advocacy to immigrants in removal proceedings. These organizations collectively handle thousands of cases annually, including appeals to the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), which is part of the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) under the U.S. Department of Justice. The defendants include EOIR, its Director, the BIA Chair, and the Attorney General. At the center of the dispute is an Interim Final Rule (IFR) issued by EOIR on February 6, 2026, and published in the Federal Register at 91 Fed. Reg. 5267. The IFR aim...