Z Visa
 The
former proposed immigration reform included two major issues: border control and
immigration amnesty. An announcement that was made by U.S. senators on May 17th, 2007
revealed an agreement on the how to legalize the undocumented workers in the
United States and secure the borders. Former President Bush praised the agreement and
encouraged lawmakers to approve the measure. The former President also indicated that he
was ready to sign an immigration bill which would improve the borders and legalize illegal
aliens in the United States. However, the proposed immigration reform was not
passed in Congress, ending former President Bush's hopes of making headway on
the immigration issue while still in office.
The proposed immigration reform agreement
was not an
amnesty, but a comprehensive immigration reform bill
that could have potentially effected 12 to 20 million (the exact number is unknown) undocumented workers in the
United States. A new visa category was proposed, called a Z visa, which
would have been issued only to
undocumented workers. The purpose of the Z visa was to make
sure that all undocumented workers would be assigned a visa category-- allowing them to legally
live and work in the United States while their cases are being reviewed.In order to qualify for
the proposed Z visa, applicants would have been required to prove that they arrived in the
United States before January 1st, 2007. The Z visa is renewable in four year
increments, and it may lead to permanent residency (a
Green Card).
 "The agreement we just reached is the best possible chance we will have
in years to secure our borders, bring millions of people out of the shadows and
into the sunshine of America"
May
17, 2007
Ted Kennedy -- Senator from Massachusetts
Member of the Democratic Party |
The formerly proposed Z visa came with a fine of $5,000 per person, and the
stipulation that the individual must
return to their home country to legally be admitted into the United States.
Families of undocumented workers would only have to send home one person; the
head of the family. The time lag between the issuance of the Z visa and the
return trip may be as long as two years, which means that the undocumented
worker would have been able to legally work in the United States until they must
leave the country to stay in compliance with the Z visa rules. However, the
amount of years that must be spent out of the country was speculated to have
been more than 5 years
before the individual could legally return. The amount of Z visas that will be
allowed per year is much larger than any other visa program and may be as many
as 500,000 per year.
Once an individual has had the background check, been approved, left the country
for a number of years and returned legally, he or she would have been able to obtain U.S. residency in 8 to 13 years,
according to the proposed legislation. Mexico has by far the largest number of
undocumented immigrants in the United States, and their authorities praised this
new proposed immigration bill and call it an “important step”.
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Additional temporary work programs include a point based system similar to work
programs available in Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom, where
individuals can immigrate based upon their skills, education, knowledge of the
English language, instead of family ties in the United States. To balance the need for
low and high skilled workers, the current H-1B Visa cap is also estimated to
rise to 115,000 visas per year from the current 65,000 visas being offered.
Important: The proposed "Z Visa" was part of the former comprehensive immigration
reform bill. However, this bill was not passed by Congress. Subscribe to
the free US Immigration Newsletter for the latest
immigration reform and amnesty news.
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