Our Expert Knowledge to Support Immigration Practitioners
Immigrant Visa Processing
Jonathan was a key stakeholder in the design of the modern Department of State Visa Bulletin.
• Advised senior leaders at USCIS and the Department of State on the implementation of visa priority dates and dates to file applications methodologies.
• Led the Texas Service Center to manage thousands of immigrant visa cases on an annual basis to ensure that all available immigrant visas were fully utilized.
• Partnered with Department of State leaders to recommend cut-off dates for filing I-485 applications.
Non-Immigrant Temporary Worker Visas
Jonathan led the workload management for multiple temporary non-immigrant worker benefit programs including H, L, O, and P non-immigrant worker petitions.
• Led the annual numerical assessment of the H-1B Cap lottery to set targets for the number of cases to be accepted for processing.
• Led the teams to coordinate the seamless receipt and ingestion of H-1B Cap cases by agency contractors on an annual basis.
• Designed, led, and implemented the realignment of the H and L non-immigrant visa programs to additional USCIS Service Centers to reduce the potential for backlogs and ensure that these cases were adjudicated timely.
• Established jurisdictional alignments for O and P non-immigrant worker petitions for the California and Vermont Service Centers.
Family Sponsored Petitions
Jonathan led the management and large-scale backlog reduction of pending family-sponsored petitions to include I-129F and I-130 petitions.
• Reduced a national backlog of I-130 petitions to five months processing time.
• Led Adam Walsh Act case reviews and served as a final decision maker for particularly complex I-130 petitions.
• Partnered with the Department of State to institute processes and procedures to ensure that family-sponsored petitions approved by USCIS were timely routed to and received by the Department of State for overseas processing of family members.
T, U, and VAWA Petitions
As the Deputy Director for the Vermont Service Center and later the Director for the HART Service Center, Jonathan led USCIS to significantly reduce processing times for T, U, and VAWA I-360 self-petitions.
• Expanded the U Bona Fide Determination (U-BFD) program to enable 70% of U-Visa self-petitioners (and later their derivative family members) to obtain an initial review of their cases.
• Addressed fraud trends for VAWA I-360 self-petitions and worked with the USCIS Director to implement a national program to interview these cases.
Asylum/Refugee Processing
For nearly a decade, Jonathan led teams at the Texas Service Center to reduce a national backlog of Asylum-based I-485 applications and I-730 Asylee/Refugee petitions.
• Recognized as a national expert on Terrorist-related Inadmissibility Ground (TRIG) issues. Jonathan helped formulate and implement policies to evaluate the eligibility of these applicants and petitioners for these immigration benefits.
• Partnered with USCIS international offices to implement policies and procedures to facilitate the efficient processing of derivative family members to reunite with their relatives in the United States.
Processing Times and Data Analytics
Jonathan is considered a leading authority on the calculation of USCIS processing times and the ability of USCIS to complete the adjudication of immigration benefits within defined timeframes.
• Partnered with agency statisticians to design the current processing time methodology for Service Center forms.
• Designed and implemented the use of electronic tools used to measure individual officer performance against agency key performance indicators (KPIs).
• Served as an agency leader in the preparation of annual operating plans that were used to project the number of cases USCIS received and the number of employees needed to adjudicate them.