Effective October 1, 2016, green cards will become more readily available for most people immigrating to the United States on employment-based (EB) immigrant visa categories.
The US State Department announced in the October 2016 edition of its Visa Bulletin that the agency is processing requests under the EB1 category for all countries of birth, effective October 1. This category includes aliens of extraordinary ability, outstanding professors and researchers, and multinational managers and executives, regardless of place of birth. During the summer, the agency reported a lengthy backlog for EB1 immigrants born in mainland China and India.
The EB2 category—for professionals with an advanced degree and aliens of exceptional ability—is also immediately available, except for individuals born in mainland China and India, for whom the category is backlogged to February 15, 2012, and January 15, 2007, respectively.
The EB3 category—for professionals and skilled workers—has limited available for all places of birth. That said, the backlog for most places is to June 1, 2016, and it is not likely to slow the process of immigration, since the Department of Labor generally takes more than four months to grant the alien employment certification application, often referred to as PERM, longer and that is a prerequisite for EB3 immigration.
The EB5 category—for investors—is currently available for all places of birth except mainland China, which continues to be where the majority of EB5 immigrants are born. EB5 is unavailable for China-born investors in projects in Regional Centers, while EB5 is available to China-born investors in non-Regional Center projects who have I-526 immigrant petition receipt dates on or before February 22, 2014.
There is an annual limited supply of immigrant visas in all EB categories that is replenished effective October 1, the first day of the new fiscal year. In categories where the annual demand tends to be greater than the limited supply, the Visa Bulletins issued for October through April often show the most movement. There is often more movement in the dates for individuals born in mainland China and India during these months. The EB1 and EB5 dates that have improved so much since the September 2016 Visa Bulletin are likely to retrogress once again later in the fiscal year, but the State Department did not release a prediction as to when or by how much.
The full text of the October 2016 Visa Bulletin can be found here.
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