Biden’s H-4 Work Permit Plan a Step Toward Fixing Program Woes

President Joe Biden’s proposal for legislation giving spouses of H-1B visa holders work authorization will alleviate a lot of the uncertainty surrounding the current state of the program, but persistent problems could undermine those efforts, immigration attorneys say.

Created in 2015 via executive action by then-President Barack Obama, the initiative gave work authorization to the H-4 spouses of H-1B specialty occupation workers who’ve been approved for green cards but are waiting for them to become available. More than 120,000 people—most of them women from India—have applied for spousal employment authorization documents.

As part of his immigration package ...