Trump govt misses second deadline on H4 notification; many Indians to be hit

Washington DC: The Trump administration has failed to meet its deadline for the second time this year to issue a notification on its decision to terminate the work authorisation of H-4 visa holders, mostly Indians who are spouses of professionals having H-1B visas.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) had informed a US court in March that it was working to issue a Notice of Proposed Rule Making in June this year.

At the end of the month of June, the DHS did not give any explanation for not issuing the notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM), which would have formally kicked off the process to terminate the Obama-era decision to provide work authorisation to spouses of H-1B visa holders.

"I have no updates to provide at this time," a DHS official told PTI, noting that he cannot speculate on when a decision would be made.

Multiple times this year, as late as early June, the DHS had insisted that there was no change in its plans to rescind the Obama-era rule of providing authorisation to certain categories of H-4 visas holders.

Indian women spouses of H-1B visa holders have been beneficiaries of this provision which the Trump administration now intends to reverse.

The DHS had also missed a similar deadline in February when it told a federal court, which was hearing a litigation, that it anticipated submitting to the Office of Management and Budget for review and clearance the proposed rule in time for publication in June 2018.

The United States district court of Columbia is hearing an ongoing petition by Save Jobs USA which has filed a lawsuit against the decision of the previous Obama administration to give work authorisation to the spouses of H-1B visa workers whose green card applications have been approved.