The Equal Access to Green Cards for Legal Employment (EAGLE) Act of 2021

House of Representatives Picture of Representative Zoe Lofgren

Comprehensive immigration reform is languishing in Congress.  Although President Biden has backed reform, it is not moving forward in Congress and one can only hope that it is not dead.  If comprehensive reform efforts fail, both Presidents Biden and Obama would have failed in efforts to convince Congress to move forward on comprehensive immigration reform. 

Smaller immigration fixes may prove to be more feasible than comprehensive reform.   A press release from the National Immigration Forum announces its support for one focused immigration reform bill:

“Today Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-California) and John Curtis (R-Utah) introduced legislation that would phase out arbitrary per-country limits on employment-based visas and raise per-country caps on family-sponsored immigrant visas.

H.R. 3648, the Equal Access to Green Cards for Legal Employment (EAGLE) Act of 2021, would phase out the 7% per-country cap on employment-based immigrant visas and raise the per-country cap on family-sponsored visas to 15%. It is similar to versions of the Fairness for High Skilled Immigrants Act, which the House and Senate passed with overwhelming bipartisan support last Congress.

`This is an important bipartisan bill that would help address the excessive backlogs and create a fairer system for everyone,’ said Ali Noorani, President and CEO of the National Immigration Forum. `There are many facets of the immigration system that need congressional attention, and this has been near the top of that list for too many years. It is reassuring to see bipartisan leadership continue to move forward and tackle tough problems.'”

Fwd.us also supports the EAGLE Act of 2021.

Here is information about the bill from Congressmember Lofgren’s office.  Lofgren, a congressional leader on immigration, is one of the few former immigration lawyers in Congress.

KJ