Last week, the State Department released the June Visa Bulletin,
the Ninth Visa Bulletin for fiscal year 2022.
The biggest news is the advancement of EB2 India by a full year, which has some EB3
India applicants frustrated after downgrading their application last year.
There was also very little movement in family dates, causing many
in the family preference categories to complain that family dates have frozen.
So let's take a look at the movement for June's visa bulletin and discuss
why family dates aren't moving, what you should do if you're in
an employment based category, and predictions for future visa bulletins.
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There was so little movement this month that we will cover all four charts
back to back.
Starting with final action dates for family sponsored preference
categories, F2B Mexico moved forward one month to February 1, 2001,
and F4 Mexico moved forward two months to March 1, 2000.
There was no movement in the family sponsored dates for filing chart.
Turning to employment dates, the final action chart had a big leap
in EB2 India by a full year to September 1, 2014.
The only other movement in this chart was in the other workers categories
for El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras;
Mexico; the Philippines; and all other chargeability areas
which were previously current but now have a priority of May 8, 2019.
This is due to an increasing interest in this category from a wide
variety of employers seeking skilled workers who do not hold advanced degrees.
And the last chart is the employment-based dates
for filing chart, which had no movement this month.
USCIS has also announced that family applicants
should use the dates for filing chart in the June Visa Bulletin,
and employment applicants should use the final action dates chart.
So why is there no movement in the family dates
while some employment dates move by a full year?
The reason family dates seem to have been frozen is
because so few interviews are taking place at U.S.
embassies and consulates abroad.
As a result, the Bureau of Consular Affairs
is artificially stopping all dates when really they should be progressing
dates as demand continues to outpace supply.
Until the rate of immigrant visa interviews returns to pre-pandemic levels
for the majority of consular posts, family dates will continue to stand still,
if not retrogress.
Note that if you are in the family based second preference
category, which is spouses and children of permanent residents,
you should consider filing for the I-485 adjustment of status as soon as possible.
This category only remains current to generate demands for filings,
and there is a high likelihood that a cutoff date will soon be introduced.
As for employment dates, the reason we saw India's EB2 final action date jump
by a full year is because USCIS has been able to service
all of the applications they received after advancing EB2 India
filing dates by a full year back in April's Visa Bulletin.
This significant forward movement has some people upset
because USCIS is prioritizing EB2 dates,
despite many applicants with earlier priority dates having downgraded to EB3.
So if you are an EB3 downgrade applicant, there are a couple of things you can do.
First, you can link your pending I-485 to another EB2 I-140
petition by interfiling, which is the process for transferring
the underlying basis of your application from one category to another.
Note that if you do this, there is no set time
frame for USCIS to make the link between the two.
It could take weeks or months to complete.
Second, EB3 downgrade applicants can also file a separate I-485
based on their EB2 I-140 in order to keep both EB2
and EB3 tracks open, just remember that this will require additional filing
fees and processing steps.
Going forward, USCIS might wait another month or two before advancing EB3
in order to get a better understanding of those who interfiled from EB3 to EB2.
But based on current numbers,
it does not appear that EB3 will reach Jan 2014 within the fiscal year.
One of the things that could fix this backlog is if Congress recaptured
unused green cards,
which is currently being discussed by a bipartisan group of senators.
I will include a link to that video here.
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