Open Letter Requesting Visa Deadline Extensions for Immigrants during the COVID-19 Pandemic
Sign to support the open letter: https://bit.ly/ExtendVisaDeadlines
April 17, 2020
Open Letter Requesting Visa Deadline Extensions for Immigrants during the COVID-19 Pandemic
To: Rep. Zoe Lofgren (Chair), Rep. Pramila Jayapal (Vice-Chair), Rep. Ken Buck (Ranking Member), U.S. House Subcommittee on Immigration and Citizenship; Sen. John Cornyn (Chair) and Sen. Dick Durbin (Ranking Member), U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Border Security and Immigration; Ken Cuccinelli, Acting Director, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; Chad Wolf, Acting U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security
As a coalition of business leaders, we hear on a daily basis the pain, frustration and fear that our foreign-born employees and customers face given the uncertainty surrounding immigration in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Our community of employees and customers are scared. They’re scared about their health. They’re scared about their livelihoods. They shouldn’t be scared about whether they’re still welcome in the United States. On their behalf, we ask for your help in easing this uncertainty.
We come together today to call for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to eliminate the uncertainty and burden by extending all deadlines and statuses for nonimmigrant visa holders lawfully present in the United States until 90 days after the state of emergency declared by the President has come to a close. The need for clarity and compassion from our government is critical because no one should put their health and safety at risk at a time when borders are largely closed and the ability to study or work has dramatically changed.
As the nation recognizes Ellis Island Day today and celebrates the contributions of immigrants, this call is more appropriate than ever to ensure that millions of immigrants living in the United States today can remain here and positively contribute to American society now and in the difficult recovery times ahead. Immigrants play a key role in American society and are essential to saving lives today and rehabilitating our economy tomorrow. Despite making up just 13% of the population, they are over-represented as small business owners, entrepreneurs, healthcare workers, and more. 16.5% of all healthcare workers in the United States are foreign-born. Moreover, new business is the main driver of the job growth in the U.S. and accounts for $1.3T of annual sales. The contributions of immigrants are more important than ever.
We are in a national emergency. The focus of our individuals and institutions — public and private — should be on protecting the health and safety of our communities. By and large, state and federal governments have shown tremendous compassion, creativity, and resourcefulness during this crisis. We also recognize and applaud efforts USCIS and the Department of Homeland Security have taken to combat the COVID-19 crisis by suspending in-person services, providing guidance on emergency services and showing flexibility in requirements related to Form I-9 compliance. However, these measures simply do not do enough to resolve the disruption that the COVID-19 pandemic has caused to standard immigration procedures. Today, we ask for a correction in the face of these extraordinary circumstances.
Our world and country face unprecedented challenges, and there is a simple, commonsense way to support the thousands of immigrants continuing to help us take on the difficult road ahead. With the country in many ways effectively at a standstill to combat the spread of COVID-19, affected immigrants, as well as the many of us ready to support their stay here, are torn between jeopardizing their lawful presence in our communities or risking their health to file documentation, engage in travel or find new employment. Extending immigration deadlines and statuses during a time of national emergency prevents very real physical, emotional and operational burdens on our businesses and communities which are already stretched far beyond normal circumstances.
Thank you for your attention to this important issue.
Signed,
Misha Esipov, Co-founder & CEO, and Nicky Goulimis, Co-founder & COO, Nova Credit
Ash Gupta, Former CRO and President of Risk & Information Management & Banking Group, American Express
Ashton Kutcher, General Partner, Sound Ventures
Eileen Serra, Former CEO, Chase Cards; Board Director, Women’s Refugee Commission; Board Director, Family Promise
Bill Harris, Chairman, One Finance
Adrian Garcia-Aranyos, President, and Nasim Novin, Director, Endeavor
Jennifer Tescher, President & CEO, Financial Health Network
Raul Vazquez, CEO, Oportun
Dan Quan, Former Senior Advisor to the Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Anil Arora, Former CEO, Yodlee, and former Vice Chair, Envestnet
Armen Meyer, Vice President for Public Policy, Lending Club
Mike Vernal, Partner, Sequoia
Angela Strange, Partner, Andreessen Horowitz
Ilya Fushman, Managing Partner, and Monica Desai, Principal, Kleiner Perkins
Bill Trenchard, Partner, and Hayley Barna, Partner, First Round Capital
Esther Benjamin, CEO & Executive Director, World Education Services
Robert Frohwein, Co-founder & CEO, and Kathryn Petralia, Co-founder & President, Kabbage
Eric Sager, COO, Plaid
Krish Nagpal, Analytics Lead, Verizon
Susan Ehrlich, CEO, and Anna Farnsworth, Head of Talent, Earnest
Matt Oppenheimer, Co-Founder & CEO, Remitly
Brad Garlinghouse, CEO, Ripple
Jason Gross, Co-founder & CEO, Petal Card
Julie Samuels, Executive Director, Tech:NYC
Jeffrey Reitman, Partner, Canapi Ventures
Courtney Buie Lipkin, Partner, Susa Ventures
Ken McEldowney, Executive Director, Consumer Action
Xiao Wang, CEO, Boundless
Mada Seghete, Founder, Branch
Emmanuel ‘Manu’ Smadja, Co-Founder and CEO, MPOWER Financing
Jimmy Chen, Founder & CEO, Propel
Joaquín Ayuso de Pául, GM, Rayo
Carole Robin, Co-founder, and Joe Greenstein, Co-founder, Leaders in Tech
Cadran Cowansage, CEO & Co-Founder, Elpha
Ennie Lim, CEO, and Max Zschoch, CPO, HoneyBee
Tristan Louis, President & CEO, Casebook PBC
Ethan Block, CEO, Digit
Pejman Nozad, Managing Partner, and Mar Hershenson, Managing Partner, Pear VC
Nashley Mascarenhas, Head of Revenue Strategy, Marqeta
Tyler McIntyre, Founder, Novo Bank
Andrija Vrdoljak, Head of Business Development and Strategy, Turo, Inc.
Taylor Lembi, Founder & CEO, Intellirent
Sarah Pinto, Partner, Emerson Collective
Sam Hodges, Co-founder & CEO, Travis Hedge, Co-founder & VP BD, Vouch
Tommy Nicholas, Co-founder & CEO, Laura Spiekerman, Co-founder & CRO, Alloy
Manan Mehta, Founding Partner, Unshackled Ventures
Oleg Rogynskyy, CEO, People.ai
Felix Steinmeyer, Co-founder & CEO, Charles Mourani, Co-founder & CTO, Cherry Installments
David Sokolow, Product Manager, Intuit
Nico Barawid, Founder & CEO, Casai
Abbey Wemimo and Samir Goel, Co-founders and Co-CEOs, Esusu
Adam Jiwan, Founder & CEO, Spring Labs
Charlie Maynard, Co-founder & CEO, Going Merry
Kristen Berman, Co-founder & CEO, Irrational Labs
Eugene Yi, Co-founder, Cortico
Rahim Lakhani, CFO, LetGo
Romish Badani, CEO, Bridge
Kathryn Minshew, Co-founder & CEO, and Alexandra Cavoulacos, Co-founder & President, The Muse
Ganesh Kumar, Former Global Head of Product Growth and Analytics, Amazon
Jerry Nemorin, Founder & CEO, LendStreet
Aleksei Likuev, Partner, Gromado LLC
Dheerja Kaur, Chief Product Officer, theSkimm
Jake Gibson, Founding Partner, Better Tomorrow Ventures and former COO & Co-founder, NerdWallet
Shamir Karkal, Co-founder & CEO, Sila
Leo Wang, CEO, and Michael Rothkopf, Co-Founder & VP Business Development, Buffy
Jeffrey Shu, Financial Partnerships, Affirm Inc.
Kai Stinchcombe, Co-Founder & CEO, Claire McDonnell, Co-founder & COO, Truelink Financial
Scott Kazmierowicz, Co-founder & CEO, Michael Spelfogel, Co-founder & President, Guild
Shannon Austin, Partner, Financial Venture Studio
Ben Casnocha, Co-Founder & Partner, Village Global
Julien Bonneville, Founder & CEO, The Guarantors
David Hannes, Founder & CEO, Loved
Gauri Manglik, Co-founder & CEO, Instrumentl
Nolan Greenberg, Founder & CEO, Worth Search
Amitay Kalmar, Co-founder & CEO, Lendbuzz
Nicholas Bergson-Shilcock, Co-founder & CEO, Recurse Center
Fiona Lee, Co-founder & COO, Pod Foods Co
Cate Rung, Co-founder & COO, Png.me
Lindsay Ullman, CEO & Co-Founder, Umbrella
Emmanuel Schalit, CEO, and Ciara Lakhani, Chief People Officer, Dashlane
Thomson Nguyen, CEO, Hatch
Angela Ceresnie, CEO, Climb Credit
Avichal Garg, Founding Partner, Electric Capital
Howard Tischler, Co-founder & CEO, EverSafe
Amira Yahyaoui, CEO, Mos
Sheel Mohnot, Founder, Better Tomorrow Ventures
Fatima Husain, Principal, Comcast Ventures
Alex Marshall, Special Projects, First Round Capital and former Director of Platform, Backstage Capital
Shoaib Makani, Founder & CEO, KeepTruckin
Theo Osborne, Managing Partner, 9Yards Capital
Laura Kornhauser, Co-founder & CEO, Stratyfy
Chapman Snowden, CEO, Brick Labs
Matthew Goldman, Founder & CEO, Vertical Finance, Inc.
Alexander Cohen, Co-Founder, CommandDot
Hiten Shah, Co-Founder & CEO, FYI
Jodianna Ringel, Executive Director, Princeton in Africa
Matt Carey, Co-founder & CEO, Blueprint Income
Billy Parish, Founder & CEO, Mosaic
C. David Bergendahl, CEO, Hugo Insurance
Ross Fubini, Managing Partner, XYZ Venture Capital
Arjan Schütte, and Kathleen Utech, Managing Partners, Core Innovation Capital
Lori Shao, CEO, Finii
Thomas Neckel, CEO, Cove
Michael Galluppo, Founder, OLY.AI.Inc.
Addie Lerner, Founder & Managing Partner, Avid Ventures
Farron Blanc, Co-Founder & CEO, Gerry
Keith Moore, CEO & Chairman, Cyberpolicy
Adam Wilson, Founder, Divirod
Ed Srager, CEO, Imagine
Charlie Olson, CEO, Pando
Aaron Smith, Co-founder, Savi
SriSatish Ambati, Co-Founder & CEO, H2O.ai
Sanj Goyle, CEO, Finextra
Andrew Jiang, CEO, Soda Labs
Jessica Chen Riolfi, Ex-Head of Product, Earnin
Oleksandra Rohachova, CEO, Inkhunter
Kamil Mroczek, Founder, Sense360
Basar Basaran, Co-Founder, Kunduz
PV Boccasam, CEO, WealthEngine
Babu Sivadasan, CEO, Paninni
Brian Hamilton, Co-Founder & CEO, One Finance
Alex Zhou, Co-founder & CEO, Refund Giant
Danny Grossman, CEO, Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund
Anthony P. Brenner, Managing Partner, Pivot Point Capital
Curtis Spencer, Managing Partner, Electric Capital
Nifemi Aluko, CEO, Kpakpakpa Inc
Ryan Jones, CEO & Co-founder, Budler
Sahil Vakil, Founder, MYRA Wealth
Bora V. Hamamcioglu, Founder & CEO, Carhopper
Sameh Elamawy, CEO, Scratch
Katherine Hasiotis, Chief Commercial Officer, Fintech Today
Michael Basch , Managing Partner, Atento Capital
Neerav Mehta, Founder & CEO, Red Crackle
Yura Riphyak, co-CEO, YouTeam
Adam Nelson, Partner, FirstMark
Susan Lyne, General Partner, BBG Ventures
Arjita Sethi, CEO, Equally
Melbourne O’Banion, Co-Founder & CEO, Bestow
Joseph Quan, Co-founder & CEO, Twine Labs
Priya Pai, General Counsel, Even Responsible Finance, Inc.
John Frye, Founder, Finesse Media
Hans Galland, CEO, Haulistix Inc
Deepak Vinchhi, Co-Founder & COO, Julia Computing, Inc.
Kevin Dowling, CEO, Kaarta, Inc.
Brett Rochkind, Managing Partner, BRK Capital
Alexia Tsotsis, Founder & General Partner, Dream Machine
Pankaj Jain, Partner and President, Scienaptic AI
Rostam Zafari, Founder, World Within
Cyril Berdugo, Co-Founder, Landis
Esteban Reyes, Partner, 57 Capital Management
Martin Attiq, Executive Vice President, Astra
Dalton L Dallazem, Founding Partner, Perin & Dallazem Attorneys at Law
Leigh Honeywell, CEO, Tall Poppy
Nadine Lehner, Founder, Chulengo Expeditions
John Waldeisen, Co-founder, Lucira Health, Inc.
Yuriy Kirichok, CSO, Equator Therapeutics
Max Kornblith, Co-Founder, FairShake
Babak Hamadani, Founder, PrimeSet
Catherine Jue, CEO, Tekuno
Jeff Ferber, CTO, Abstract Labs
Zainab Lateefi, Head of Product, Lifesaver
Soren Sudhof, Managing Director, Maverick Capital
Adena Hefets, CEO, Divvy Homes
Gustavo Gorenstein, Founder, bxblue
David Frankel, Managing Partner & Co-founder, Founder Collective
Mai Ton, CEO, EMP HR Consulting
Tasso Roumeliotis. Founder & CEO, NumberAI
Carolyn Rundell, CEO, HERO Marketing
Nadim Homsany, Co-Founder & President, EarnUp
James Hyde, CEO, Venminder
Theodora Lau, Founder, Unconventional Ventures
Alexi G. Nazem, Co-founder & CEO, Nomad Health
Michael Bloch, CEO, Pillar
Anita Hossain, Co-Founder, The Grand
Christos Karafeizis, Co-Founder and CEO, Gaspardesk
Garrett Reynolds, Co-founder & CTO, Upcodes
James Gutierrez, CEO, Aura
Ruben Izmailyan, Founder & CEO, Quiltt
Einar Vollset, General Partner, Tiny Seed
Ricardo Garcia-Amaya, Founder & CEO, VOIQ Inc.
Jim Tam, Executive Vice President, Gnowbe
Arjun Iyer, CEO, Signadot
Jacques Thelemaque, President, Filmmakers Alliance
Jag Puttanna, CEO, EmpInfo
Slava Solonitsyn, CEO & Co-founder, Mighty Buildings
Andie Kaplan, Founder & CEO, ConnectED Mobile
Ali Attaie, President, hellosmile
Rostopher Geller, CEO, R-Squared
Nick Winter, CEO, CodeCombat
Lauro Chartrand, President, Dream Chaser Productions
Atticus LeBlanc, Founder & CEO, PadSplit
Alfredo P. O’Hagan, Senior Vice President — Consumer Payments, IDT Payment Services
Naman Kumar, CEO, Airo Health
Jared Glover, CEO, CapSen Robotics
Nikil Ragav, CEO, inventXYZ
Mark Shesser, CEO, Coldsmoke Creative
François Baldasssari, CEO, Memfault, Inc.
Ash Rust, Partner, Sterling Road
Jonathan Petts, Executive Director, Immigrants Like Us
Scott Fasser, VP Marketing, Sigma IQ
Baris Akis, Co-founder, Human Capital
Sankaet Pathak, CEO, Synapse
Derek Greenfield, CEO, Industrial Microbes
Ram Ravichandran, Managing Partner, Specialized Types
Cathrine Andersen, Co-founder & CEO, Roger.Ai
Daria Gonzalez, CEO, Wunderdogs
Adriana C. Vazquez, Co-founder & CEO, Lilu
Karli Barokas, CEO, Barokas Communications
Nina Faulhaber, Co-founder & Co-CEO, and Meg He, Co-founder & Co-CEO, ADAY
Rodolfo Gonzalez, Partner, and Ashu Garg, Partner, Foundation Capital
Nicole Quinn, Partner, Lightspeed Venture Partners
Karen Rios, CEO, Lifesaver
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Questions? contact arrive@novacredit.com
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