All I want is a chance to legally live, work, and defend the Constitution of my country.

I feel for her. Obviously she's committed and wants to stay. It may well be that the immigration system is screwed up. I wouldn't be surprised. But, correction, it's not "her" country and Constitution (nor mine), and still wouldn't be under this arrangement. Perhaps it's a good idea. But obviously she expects it to be permanent if she's thinking that way. If you think it's hard to toss someone out now, try it after they've been there 20 years.

Not unbelievable at all, once you understand how this game is played.

"Has a demonstrated history of commitment to [extremely narrow definition]" is somewhere in that job description. Together with a derisory salary to make sure that any American who accidentally gets through that filter does not in fact apply.

It doesn't sound as if she's short of money, just has her heart set on rearranging our laws to suit her ideas. Oh well.

The other problem is how convoluted, changeable, and painfully bureaucratic our immigration system is. When I worked at a research institute that was 30% European-funded with a similar percentage of European employees, we had a lawyer who was dedicated to keep up with immigration issues but we still had cases where people returning to the U.S. after international travel were denied re-entry because the required forms had changed in the past month. It's amazing that I can enter an EU nation with my passport and a smile while we're conducting retina scans and interrogations on our end.

One can't help but wonder if this is partisan politics. Right-to-work isn't exactly a popular cause with the Labor Department, and most of the groups that advocate it are GOP-affiliated.

She's probably not brown/liberal enough to vote for the President.

Forgive me for being so cynical.

Oh man, I feel for her. The system is so stacked against people trying to get citizenship the legal way. I had some friends who were in the process of immigrating here from Canada. Fortunately the wife's father was an American citizenship so it was *relatively* easy for her to get citizenship. Still, it took a year to get all the nessecary paperwork for to prove her deceased father was enough of an American for her to be one. Try finding a birth certificate for a black kid born at home in Detroit during the Great Depression. Then try to find his school records. (And he didn't have a SSN until he entered the army at 18).

Finally, it all gets straightened out for her and she's a citizen. Yay! Then she finds out someone misfiled the paperwork for her son who's going to be 18 in two months and he's not a citizen yet. That gets taken care of in a fashion that can only be described as "down to the wire."

But her family is all together now and it's only a matter of time before her husband's citizenship comes through. To comply with the terms of his visa, in addition to not working he has to cross the border back into Canada every three months (quite a drive from their home in FL.) He leaves on one of these trips, expecting to be back home in four days. As he crosses back into the USA the border guard stops him and flags his visa. Because he's crossed the border so many times, my buddy is considered a possible illegal immigrant and denied entry into the country. For seven months, he has to stay in Canada until he can get his green card. It came down to a single interview with a beuracrat and if denied would have left my friend unable to enter the USA for another five years at least. Fortunately, the story has a happy ending and my buddy made it back home to Florida.

You cannot even begin to imagine how upset he gets over illegal immigration amnesty.

I say GOOD RIDDANCE! Why so cold? Well, the next to last paragraph ticked me off. Why is that? Well, MY daughter is a trained attorney in the DC Metro area with EXACTLY those qualifications and is trying to find a spot. Law jobs are tight right now. My daughter was born here, educated here and ought to have first shot instead of someone that keeps saying they want to work for "their" country. Well, "their" country is somewhere else. Get In Line!

Frankly, the USA should welcome high-skilled people with very little paperwork. However, those aren't the rules.

phunctor and Carl have identified what happened: The organization wanted her, so they wrote a job description that no one else in the universe could fulfill. They then had to advertise that position, so they posted their ad on microfilm, in the broom closet, in the basement.

This just goes to show what a hassle it is to try to immigrate legally. Immigrating illegally is easy by comparison, and you eventually get amnesty anyway.

Stupid, stupid, stupid system...

"There is no one else in the DC metro area who is a licensed attorney" LOL, this area has more liscensed atourneys than you can shake a stick at. Never saw on a job application, must care about job mission.

Yes I am all infavor of immigration reform, however NOT he reform anyone in the gov't is currently pushing.

I live in Silicon Valley. A lot of the tech companies complain that the government needs to increase the number of H1B visas to allow more qualified workers to be hired by the industry. Yet, the tech industry is constantly laying off employees, many who have been out of work for years. If these companies want qualified workers, why aren't they hiring all those who have been laid off first before recruiting from other countries?

H-1B visas are for specialists. She's not a specialist, she's a goddamned fucking lawyer during a glut of lawyers. Attorneys are a dime a dozen and many can't find jobs.

Send her non-specialist ass back to the UK.

No H-1B visas until any company wanting an H-1B visa employee agrees to place an HR representative or walk off the street access to the hiring manager at any location they want an H-1B visa employee at.

Also, take the dimes away from the momzer supplying them for lawyers.

What, we need another snotty Brit in this country?

I'll trade this useless Royalist for a dozen hard-working third-worlders any day of the week.

Go home, ya limey git.

Also, what Jerry said. What Fayd said (we might be neighbors!). What Carl said.

End rant.

Frankly, the USA should welcome high-skilled people with very little paperwork. However, those aren't the rules.

Yep. I for one want the best and the brightest to come HERE.

This country needs more fruit pickers than it does lawyers. If we're going to be giving out passes, we need to be giving them to people willing to do the manual labor Americans won't do. Lots of Americans want to be lawyers.

"My daughter was born here, educated here and ought to have first shot"

My boss is an Alien of Extraordinary Abilities. Company paid the legal bills to allow him to immigrate (well actually he's Canadian and Canada is like our 51st state so barely an immigrant). He's F-ing brilliant at what we do. There are a handful I have met as good as him. He's four years older than me. So basically I will live out my career playing second fiddle to an immigrant. As it should be. If I am willing, I will learn something everyday of my life from this guy. We are also public servants. So you have to weigh one less six figure job for an American against the best man for the job, the best man for the public interest.

I want the best man for the job, even if I'm working under him. no, especially if I'm working under him.

screw yer birthrights.

"If we're going to be giving out passes, we need to be giving them to people willing to do the manual labor Americans won't do."

and then pay them a living wage, right? I briefly worked in the precision farming industry, we are innovating our way from fruit picker as a job to fruit picker as a technology, that's how damn good we are. Stay off the front.

At least she's a British Lawyer not a British chef.

we are innovating our way from fruit picker as a job to fruit picker as a technology,

That's the case for just about every industry. Whatever your job is, a robot will do it better sooner or later.

Maybe she'll wise up, move to Mexico, and come here as an "undocumented immigrant."

The organization wanted her, so they wrote a job description that no one else in the universe could fulfill

That's precisely how it works. It's entirely possible they even got her to write the job description to make sure. I do find it extremely hard to believe they couldn't find anyone else (lawyers in DC? sheesh), but I know how it's done and obviously they didn't want to.

I don't have a real problem with that. I understand why organisations want to hire a specific person (has proven to fit in well, for instance, all those intangibles that don't show up on a resume) over whatever other candidates might be out there. That's why they game the system like this. Doesn't seem to have worked this time.

Getting back to the original question

But should we allow talented others from other countries to work in this country -- if they agree to not apply for benefits?

Sure, as long as they get a 50% discount (or whatever it works out to) on federal taxes and their employer doesn't have to pay SS contributions, to cover all the things they signed away. That sounds fair. I mean, you're getting the benefit of their talent, so why should they fund entitlements they have no access to?