United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the agency within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security that administers the country’s naturalization and immigration system, announced recently that it has conducted an unprecedented third H-1B visa lottery for fiscal year (FY) 2022 (October 1, 2021 – September 30, 2022). This unusual development comes in the wake of the first and second lottery selections, conducted in March and July of this year, which failed to produce enough visa petitions to reach the FY 2022 statutory H-1B cap of 85,000 H-1B visas.
H-1B visas are issued to foreign workers in “specialty occupations” that require the theoretical and practical application of a body of highly specialized knowledge, most commonly in computing, science, math, and engineering fields. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, demand for H-1B visas traditionally exceeded the quota set by statute, which in turn prompted the creation of an annual competitive visa lottery.
Members of the Center for Workplace Compliance (CWC) can read more here.