WASHINGTON\u2014The Department of Homeland Security will allow up to 12,999 nonimmigrants in fiscal year 2016 for the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands-Only Transitional Worker program, or CW-1. DHS published the notice in Friday\u2019s Federal Register.<\/p>\n
Under the CW-1 program, employers in the CNMI can apply for temporary permission to employ foreign nationals who are ineligible for any existing employment-based nonimmigrant category under the Immigration and Nationality Act. The CW program is in effect until Dec. 31, 2019. DHS reduced the FY 2016 CW-1 limit by 1,000 to meet the CNMI\u2019s existing labor market needs and provide opportunity for potential growth, while meeting a regulatory requirement to reduce the numerical limit each year.<\/p>\n
Friday\u2019s announcement does not affect the status of current CW-1 workers unless their employer files for an extension of their current authorized period of stay. Approved petitions with an employment-start date between Oct. 1, 2015, and Sept. 30, 2016, will generally count toward the 12,999 limit. The numerical limit applies only to CW-1 principals. It does not directly affect anyone currently holding CW-2 status, which is for spouses and minor children of CW-1 nonimmigrants. However, CW-2 nonimmigrants may be indirectly affected because their status depends upon that of the principal CW-1.<\/p>\n
For more information and announcements about immigration benefits in the CNMI, visit the CNMI Web page at www.uscis.gov\/cnmi. (USCIS)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" WASHINGTON\u2014The Department of Homeland Security will allow up to 12,999 nonimmigrants in fiscal year 2016…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[26,1085,4688,1699],"class_list":["post-213047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-cnmi","tag-dhs","tag-federal-register","tag-homeland-security"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=213047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213047\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}