The Green Card Drag: How Highly Skilled Asian Indian Immigrants Experience the US Immigration System

Abstract

Foreign-born Asian Indians in the United States are among the most highly educated and highly paid. A major facilitator of this population's migration has been the H-1B, a temporary work visa that has brought in foreign scientists and engineers since 1990. Immigration scholarship would regard H-1Bs’ high socioeconomic status as a factor that smooths their integration. Yet an aspect usually not associated with high-skilled migrants–legality–may be compromising the assimilation of Asian Indian professionals: over a million are “waiting in line,” or in queue, for legal permanent residency. The delay is significant. Asian Indians have the longest wait among all nationalities, and it is only becoming increasingly longer; scholars argue that many Asian Indians, especially newcomers, will never get a green card. Drawing on 40 semi-structured interviews with US technology workers from India, the following study is among the first of its kind: it examines how Asian Indians’ experience their temporary status, or “liminal legality.” Findings show that they encounter “legal dragging”: they are in line for a green card but are given no specific acquisition date. The legal dragging of the green card process leads to feelings of stagnation, uncertainty, and frustration. Furthermore, these feelings are gendered: women experience the additional worry of having to go back to a country where they will encounter greater gender inequality. Findings illustrate that legal status plays a role in Asian Indian lives and that it can impede on the mobility of the highly skilled.