In this video, we'll talk about the October 2020 visa bulletin much anticipated.
We were waiting for it for weeks but it's finally out today.
So, what are you waiting for? I'll see you on the other side.
Hello, everybody. In this video, we'll talk about the October 2020 visa bulletin, and also,
the predictions for the month ahead. This month, the visa bulletin came pretty late. As you know,
it usually comes mid-month, we’re now almost at the end of September,
and the visa bulletin just came out today. So, we'll talk about what it means. Before that,
if you're here for the first time, make sure you subscribe to a channel,
click that bell to be notified. And also, give us the big like so YouTube will be able to recommend
this video to more people just like you. My name is Jacob Sapochnik. And I'm an immigration
attorney located in San Diego, California. And I'm making those videos for you every single week
because you asked for them, and because you're waiting for information in these crazy times of
uncertainty. So, before we talk about the actual visa bulletin, I want to explain what's happening.
So, it is important to talk about this October visa bulletin because that's when the fiscal
year starts again, right? So, every year, the visa count starts in October. This number starts
again every year. And so, that's why it's really important to know what's going to happen and how
it's going to all play out in the year by looking at this particular visa bulletin. So, this year,
the visa bulletin was released late, probably because of all of the things that are happening
in the world, the pandemic, embassies, and consulates are closed, probably numbers are
difficult to calculate. And so, as this is the first visa bulletin for the first fiscal year,
what we can learn from it, the predictions that are coming ahead are really, really important.
And we're going to talk about this in a few minutes. Because of embassy closures and lack
of interviews scheduled right now, specifically in the past six months, what is resulting from the
situation is that almost 100,000 individuals who are banned currently because of the proclamations,
they're not going to be able to get their visas. And as a result, those visas are probably going
to move to the employment categories. And that's why what we're going to see in this visa bulletin
is an advanced and rapid movement on almost all employment categories, except for a few countries,
specifically China and India. What is interesting is that on the family categories,
there's almost been no movement at all. So, yes, the F2A category is still current for people that
are currently in the US or if they're able to immigrate once the consulates are open. But
pretty much all family categories have not moved at all, since the last visa bulletin in August,
and the one in July. So, that's pretty bad on the family categories. But the reason why it's
happening is, once again, remember, we have, like I mentioned before, there are more than 100,000
people that are not going to be able to get their immigrant visas because they're not able
to get an interview schedule because they are banned from immigrating to the United States,
and because consulates and embassies are not scheduled with visa interviews. And as a result,
a lot of these immigrants are not going to be able to move to the United States or get visas,
so their visa numbers are going to be shifted to the employment-based categories.
And therefore, again, like I said, we see that rapid movement over there.
Now, let's talk about what's actually happening in the visa bulletin by going through the different
categories. Before we do that, and also, today, we wanted to find out how USCIS is going to be using
the visa bulletin chart because they have their own chart. And so, at the beginning of the day,
when the visa bulletin was released, USCIS said, they're going to be using the final action date,
which was a little bit later. And then they change their position and they said that they're going to
be processing cases based on dates of filing, which is faster. If you're inside the United
States, you have to look at the visa bulletin of USCIS. And currently, they're saying that they're
going to be processing dates of filing, the second chart. So, that's an important update. Let's take
a look at the employment categories right now and see where they stand with respect to the October
visa bulletin. EB1, all countries except for China and India are staying current in October.
China and India look like, will be advancing by three months to June 1, 2018.
EB2, China will advance by six weeks to March 1, 2016.
And India is going to move forward two months to September 1, 2009. All other countries in
EB2 are current. EB3, professionals, and skilled workers, all countries except India and China
are going to become current in October. So EB3, that's major news. It’s going to become current
in the October visa bulletin, except for two countries. So let's look at that bulletin itself.
EB3, skilled professional skilled workers, all countries are current except for India
and China. The cutoff date for China, it's going to move four and a half months to July 1, 2017.
And India, move forward three and a half months to January 15, 2010. So, that was actually expected.
We expected the EB3 to become current. So, we have a lot of people that are waiting
to file for the green card to start the process. So, that's important news. And I'm hoping that
that will continue in the next few months. Let's take a look at the EB5 category as well.
EB5 for the non-regional center program. India is also current and
other countries are current as well, except for China and Vietnam. And China remains on August 15,
2015. And Vietnam remains on August 1, 2017. Remember that the regional center program
is supposed to sunset on September 30, 2020. So, unless it's going to be extended, again,
that category is not going to be available in the next visa bulletin. And so, let's see what
happens by the end of this month. And once again, if you are inside the United States,
and you're looking at the USCIS visa bulletin, remember that they're going to go with the date
for data filing, which is a little bit faster in the [inaudible]. But that's just for the
employment categories. Now, for family, let's take a look for a second at the EB3, other workers,
non-skilled, and the EB4 category for religious workers. EB3, other workers,
remains current for other countries, except for China. It moves forward actually to December 1,
2008. EB4, employment-based category, the cutoff date, for example, Mexico is moving forward
to September 1, 2018. Countries like El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, it moves to August 1,
2017. All other countries are current. So, as you can see, while this visa bulletin came out late,
it has some pretty good progress in a lot of the employment categories. So,
let's talk about some predictions. As you can see, in this visa bulletin, while they came out late,
we have some very rapid movements, specifically on the employment categories while the family
categories have not advanced a lot. And the reason, again, like I mentioned before,
is because… there was not much movement on the family side because of the bans,
a lot of immigrant visas not being issued. So, what typically happens in this case, if there's
a surge on one category, for example, that there were not enough visas issued on the family side,
those visas are not just going to disappear, they're going to be essentially rolling over
to the employment side. And that's why the anticipation that there's going to be
an all-time record-high of more than 261,000 visas for the fiscal year, FY-21.
And those visas are going to be distributed among the different categories next year. And that's
why the prediction is that there's going to be an even more rapid movement on the employment-based.
So, we're looking at EB3 to remain current. We're looking at China and India to advance even further
and have a lot of opportunities for people from those countries to actually finally get their
green cards instead of waiting for years. Once embassies and consulates are going to
start to reopen, we anticipate that's going to start happening soon, there's going to be also
a slower, but a movement on the family categories as well because like I said, right now,
there's almost a complete halt in so many of these family categories. And a lot of you that
are watching right now, I know that many of your F2A visa categories are overseas, they're
stuck. We have some family petitions. They're also stuck because they're not getting their interviews
because of consular, they're closed for whatever reason. We have parents that are waiting for their
green cards, interviews that are not able to come right now. So, those categories that have
been stuck, and as a result, those visas and are being used. But again, those visas are not
being lost. There's a process of being rolled over right now. And they're going to be able to be used
in other different categories. And as a result, a lot of employment categories
are going to move even faster. So, now, one thing that is interesting, you can see that for example,
the EB3 category in some cases is faster than EB2, to give you an example. For example, EB3
for China in July 2017, and EB2 is in March 2016. So, there may be some opportunities for people to
downgrade their visa categories. As a procedure for that, maybe I'll talk about it in future
videos and the same thing for India where EB3 is faster than EB2 in this particular bulletin.
And that may continue for the next one as well. So, there may be a situation where people can
actually downgrade their category from EB2 to EB3, to be able to get their applications in, faster.
So, these are some of the things that people are going to start considering perhaps. Again,
these are some new things that are happening right now, we have not seen that before.
But again, we'll talk about those options as well. And maybe I'll make a separate video
explaining the process of what happens if a category that is less superior
is going faster. If there's a way to downgrade your petition. So, that may be another opportunity
for people. So, the visa bulletin for October 2020 is out really late this time. But again,
the reason it's late because there's been a lot of backlog in visa categories,
and in the family petition, there's been almost absolutely almost no movement.
And that's the result of what's happening with embassies and consulates in the world. And instead
of issuing family visas right now, because of the bans, those visas are going to be probably rolled
over to the employment. And as a result, we have a surplus and we predict a much faster movement
in a lot of the employment categories. And that will stay current for the next month ahead. So,
once again, once we know more, I promise to update you and we'll do another video as soon as I have
more information and also give you some updates from some of our own cases. Once again, if you're
here for the first time, make sure to subscribe to our channel. Click that bell to be notified of any
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