Market Research Analysts May Qualify For H-1B Visas, Says USCIS-MadKudu Settlement Indian of the world

Mountain View, Calif., Based MadKudu has reached an agreement with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services that will define the market research analyst role as a “specialized occupation.” for the purpose of obtaining an H-1B visa.

The settlement is the result of a class action lawsuit filed in April 2020 by MadKudu, a marketing operations company, founded in 2014 by Sam Levan, Francis Brero and Paul Cothenet. The Trump administration had tried to severely limit the scope of the H-1B program, removing several jobs from the list of skilled occupations.

The settlement agreement, which was approved on October 24, requires USCIS to correct the agency’s misinterpretation of the Occupational Outlook Handbook, a publication by the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics describing hundreds of occupations in the US labor market.

Based on its previous interpretation of OHO, USCIS incorrectly determined that market research analysts were not referred to as “skilled professions.” The settlement agreement amends that agency error and offers qualifying U.S. employers the opportunity to ask USCIS to reopen and reconsider their denied H-1B claims, the American Immigration Council noted, in a statement. announcing the settlement.

The American Immigration Council, the American Immigration Lawyers Association and the law firms Van Der Hout LLP, Berry Appleman & Leiden LLP and Kuck Baxter Immigration LLC represented the plaintiffs in their class action lawsuit against USCIS.

To be a member of the group, a US employer must have filed an H-1B market research analyst petition from January 1, 2019 through October 19, 2021, then USCIS must have denied the petition based on the conclusion that The OOH entry – as it existed on October 19 – failed to establish that the market research analyst is a “skilled trade” and, had it not been for USCIS ‘conclusion regarding the entry OOH, the H-1B petition would have been approved, AIC explained in a press release.

USCIS has issued guidelines compliant with the settlement, noting that class members, whose qualifying Form I-129 has been denied, can submit their Form I-290B (toll-free) no later than April 26, 2022, for obtain their request to reopen. and, if eligibility is established, their underlying I-129 H-1B claim adjudicated under the terms of the settlement agreement.

“USCIS will make a decision on all eligible and timely reopening requests within 90 days of receipt of the physical file at the adjudicatory office,” the agency said, adding: If we determine that the petition under -jacent is not eligible for this reopening process, we will reject the I-290B form.

“It is unfortunate that the only way for USCIS to follow the law and do the right thing is to take legal action. We will ensure that USCIS complies with this ruling and we will be ready. to sue for other interpretive violations of statutory law and regulation that the agency has authorized to occur, ”said Charles Kuck, managing partner at Kuck Baxter Immigration LLC.

“This settlement is an important victory that will benefit hundreds of US companies and the market research analysts they sought to employ,” said Leslie K. Dellon, Senior Counsel (Business Immigration) at the AIC.

“The settlement gives US companies another chance to get their H-1B market research analyst applications approved, this time under new guidelines developed by the parties to the lawsuit. Each reopened and approved H-1B petition will represent another opportunity for American employers and the workers they have sponsored to advance their business goals, ”said Dellon.