Reorient Immigrant Admissions Criteria

We must reorient the nation’s immigrant admissions criteria to better serve Americans and our economic goals. Family unification should remain a bedrock principle of U.S. immigration policy, but we believe that “family” must be narrowed to mean nuclear family members. We must also recognize that in today’s increasingly competitive and technology-intensive global economy, educated workers with the knowledge and skills to innovate are critical. Therefore, we recommend increasing skilled visas and replacing per-country limits on skilled visas with a single overall limit. At the same time, we recommend holding constant, at least for the present, the overall number of permanent legal residents admitted annually.

Closing the door to extended relatives and another 50,000 people admitted each year under a "diversity" lottery would make room to increase from 180,000 to 330,000 the number of skilled workers and their family members whom the U.S. could admit each year, the group said.

Labels: Immigration, India