Charles (“Charlie”) Oppenheim, Chief of the Visa Control and Reporting Division, U.S. Department of State, recently met again with the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) to discuss current trends and future projections for the various immigrant preference categories. Let’s see how those trends and projections have tracked.
Each month, the Department of State determines the cut-off dates for each of the preference categories for applicants waiting to become eligible to apply for U.S. permanent residence (green card). Please refer to our previous blogs on this topic for an overview of how the monthly Visa Bulletin works.
EB-2 and EB-3 Philippines, as Charlie expected, has remained current through May and June 2016. He expects it to remain so for the foreseeable future. For EB-3 Philippines, Charlie expected some advancement. For May 2016, that category was backdated to August 8, 2008 and, as predicted, this improved to November 1, 2008 in June 2016. Charlie is hopeful that EB-3 Philippines will advance as far as mid-2010 by the end of this fiscal year.
In recent times, the higher EB-2 China category has lagged behind EB-3 China. This has caused an influx of demand for EB-3 China. Earlier this year, Charlie indicated that the two preference categories may eventually balance. In April, he then predicted that it may be necessary to retrogress EB-2 and EB-3 China in an effort to hold number use within the annual limit. Each prediction has come to pass, with the final action dates for both EB-2 and EB-3 China retrogressing significantly – to January 1, 2010 – in the June 2016 Visa Bulletin.
At the same time, demand for the EB-1 category doubled earlier this year. However, the main effect of this explosion is not necessarily for the EB-1 category itself – which remains current for nationals of all countries – but EB-2 categories that have traditionally relied on unused EB-1 numbers spilling over to speed up their advancement. As Charlie indicated, the most significant impact has been for EB-2 India, which retrogressed significantly from the May 2016 Visa Bulletin (final action cut off set at November 22, 2008) to the June 2016 Visa Bulletin (final action cut off now set at October 1, 2004). This was also caused by continued EB-2 India demand. Meanwhile, EB-3 India is still showing slow but steady advancement, with the final action cut off date in the June 2016 Visa Bulletin set at September 22, 2004.
The July 2016 Visa Bulletin will be released in the coming days. We will continue to monitor preference category movements and trends as they arise and advise clients of any impact on their immigration matters.