<p>The USCIS announced that the number of applications for the 2017 H-1B visa program had closed and that the number of applications exceeded the number of visas available.  There are 65,000 H-1B visas available annually.  In addition there are 20,000 visas available for advanced degrees.  The USCIS will conduct a lottery to determine which applicants are eligible to apply for a visa. In a news release the USCIS stated:</p>
<p>"<span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Source Sans Pro Regular', source_sans_pro_regular, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">WASHINGTON – U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has reached the congressionally mandated H-1B cap for fiscal year (FY) 2017. USCIS has also received more than the limit of 20,000 H-1B petitions filed under the U.S. advanced degree exemption.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 0.8em 0px; color: #000000; font-family: 'Source Sans Pro Regular', source_sans_pro_regular, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">USCIS will use a computer-generated process, also known as the lottery, to randomly select the petitions needed to meet the caps of 65,000 visas for the general category and 20,000 for the advanced degree exemption.</p>
<p style="margin: 0.8em 0px; color: #000000; font-family: 'Source Sans Pro Regular', source_sans_pro_regular, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">USCIS will first randomly select petitions for the advanced degree exemption. All unselected advanced degree petitions will become part of the random selection process for the 65,000 general cap. The agency will reject and return filing fees for all unselected cap-subject petitions that are not duplicate filings.</p>
<p style="margin: 0.8em 0px; color: #000000; font-family: 'Source Sans Pro Regular', source_sans_pro_regular, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">Before running the lottery, USCIS will complete initial intake for all filings received during the filing period, which ended April 7. Due to the high number of petitions, USCIS is not yet able to announce the date it will conduct the random selection process."</p>
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