Greg Boos and I had the pleasure and honor of speaking again at the American Immigration Lawyers Association’s Annual Northwest Conference last week. The American Immigration Lawyers Association is the professional association for immigration lawyers. Reportedly, this conference was exceptionally well-attended, as interest in immigration law seems to only be increasing.
Greg’s panel was entitled “NAFTA and Border Issues.” Issues affecting cross-border travel include NAFTA TN applications, intracompany transfers, admissibility and waivers, customs seizures, and NEXUS, to name a few. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is currently in renegotiation, which has the potential of impacting U.S. immigration. Inadmissibility at the border due to concerns related to work authorization, marijuana, and immigrant intent continue to be noteworthy. Greg has long been one of the leading experts on northern border issues in the United States and Canada.
My panel was the Consular Processing Update. Consular processing involves the issuance of visas at consulates around the world. Consular officers from Montreal and Vancouver discussed recent changes that impact visa applicants. The latest challenges in consular processing include the widely reported travel bans for persons from certain countries; extended delays and administrative processing due to vetting; E visa investor and trader changes; the expansion of definitions of misrepresentation; prudential revocations of visas for DUIs,; and major processing changes for certain visas. The Department of State is working hard to update its immigrant visa processing to an all-electronic system, and is taking many steps to more closely evaluate all candidates for visas.