December 16, 2003 - In response to rumors that the H-1B cap might be imminently reached, William R. Yates, Deputy Director, Citizenship and Immigration Services stated today that the 65,000 annual cap on new H-1B visas is not near being reached at this time, but that the service would be assessing the numbers at the end of January, 2004.

In response to an inquiry from the American Immigration Lawyers Association, Mr. Yates wrote:

"We are not near the cap at this time. As I stated last week we will release information at the end of January regarding where we stand and at that time will decide whether we need to notify customers of a projected "cap date." Of course it is theoretically possible that we could reach the cap by the end of the calendar year but we would have to receive record levels of filings... I still believe that we will hit the cap this spring, but I won't be more specific until I see the numbers in January."

Berry, Appleman & Leiden will keep our clients closely apprised of any information impacting the eligibility of H-1B visas.