Congress recently passed the Border Security Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2010. It was was passed by the House of Representatives on July 28, 2010 and then by the Senate on August 5, 2010. The bill will be forwarded to the President and he is expected to sign it into law.
Out of the $ 540 million that was authorized by Congress, the U.S. Customs & Border Protection (USCBP) would receive $ 254 million to hire additional personnel, enhance border security, and construction of bases to carry out enforcement activities.
The U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement (USICE) would receive $ 80 million to hire additional agents, investigators, support personnel, and to enhance their enforcement activities.
$ 196 million would be allocated to both the U.S. Department of Justice (USDOJ) for increased law enforcement, investigative, and prosecutorial activities. The Federal Judiciary would receive $ 10 million to account for the increased caseload because of immigration and other law enforcement activities.
The law will also contain a non-enforcement related provision. The law would raise the filing and fraud detection and prevention fees for H-1B by $ 2,000 and for L-1 visas by $ 2,250 until September 30, 2014 for U.S. petitioners that have over 50 employees if over half of those employees are in the U.S. are on H-1B or L-1 visas.
The law would add to the existing provisions of both the H-1B Visa Reform Act and the L-1 Visa Reform Act as part of the larger Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2005 signed into law on December 8, 2004 and implemented on March 8, 2005.