News
China Graft in the News
A New York Times front page article on May 16, 2015 reports that China is seeking return of people it accuses of graft, corruption and economic crimes. The article mentioned U.S. prosecution of Chinese citizens in the U.S. for money laundering and visa fraud, as well as one who lied...
June Visa Bulletin
The Department of State has released its June 2015 visa bulletin and the China EB-5 cut-off date of May 1, 2013 did not change. The quota for other countries remains current. REAL ESTATE LOAN REQUEST FOR EVIDENCE (“RFE”)I hear the USCIS has issued RFEs for some cases where the investor borrowed...
Freedom of Information Act
Many Regional Centers (“RC”) are receiving notices from USCIS that someone has filed a Freedom of Information Act request for a copy of the RC’s I-924A annual reports. Someone is on a fishing expedition for information. Some are from an attorney in Florida. IIUSA has also filed a FOIA request...
DHS Proposed Changes to the EB-5 Program
Released today is a letter from DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson dated April 27, 2015, to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley about the extension of the regional center EB-5 statute, which is set to expire September 30. He suggested a number of statutory changes, most notably: • Increase the EB-5 minimum...
TEA Seminar
The excellent EB-5 economist, Michael Kester, will hold a webinar about TEAs on May 5th. Michael, at Impact DataSource, runs the popular website that allows one to research TEA by census tract. To register for this webinar, go to http://www.impactdatasource.com/teawebinar.