A Sign Of Relief For Indian H-1B Visa Holders As Joe Biden Keeps His Promises

US President Joe Biden has started delivering on his campaign promises to immigrants on the coveted H-1B visa.

On January 25, the American president withdrew a proposal to disallow dependents of H-1B holders on H-4 visas to work in the country.

The immigrant community is breathing a sigh of relief after years of anxiety brought on by former US President Trump.

H-4 under attack under Trump

Spouses of H-1B workers were first awarded the right to be gainfully employed by the Barack Obama administration in 2015.

But in 2017, the department of homeland security and US Citizenship and Immigration Services introduced the “Removing H-4 Dependent Spouses from the Class of Aliens Eligible for Employment Authorization” rule.

Those on the H-4 visa (nine in 10 of whom are highly-skilled women from India) already struggled to maintain jobs, insurance (and sanity) under Trump.

Biden’s H-4 reform

Of course, this is only the first step. There are still kinks in the system that need ironing out. In June 2019, many applicants banded together to sue the government over unwarranted delays.

That remains a hindrance, one hopeful Poonam VR wrote on the Facebook group “H4 visa, a curse”:

Most of those suffering are long-term US residents, originally from India, who have been stuck in a decades-long green card backlog that they did not foresee when they first moved to the “land of opportunity.”

Furthermore, dependent kids of Indians face a larger looming threat courtesy of this green card limbo. If their parents' green card does not come through before they turn 21, they “age out.” They then have to switch to student or work visas to stay in the US or face deportation.

The H-1B workers themselves are still waiting on Biden to reverse last year’s freeze on travel for H-1B workers that Trump extended until March 31.