Business Immigration Insights

The Visa Bulletin is released monthly by the Department of State and is used to determine when a sponsored foreign national can submit the final step of the green card process. The complete visa bulletin can be found here.

Below is a summary of the December Visa Bulletin, including Final Action Dates and changes from the previous month. Contrary to projections announced in the September Visa Bulletin, the EB-1 category will NOT return to current in December. In fact, despite some insignificant forward movement, unprecedented backlogs will continue in this category for all countries. The December Visa Bulletin does not include the customary note to explain this deviation.

• China: EB-1 advances slightly to September 1, 2016, EB-2 advances another six weeks to July 1, 2015, and EB-3 creeps forward seven days to at June 8, 2015
• India: EB-1 moves ahead three months to September 1, 2016, EB-2 advances six days to April 1, 2009, and EB-3 jumps forward two months to March 1, 2009
• Philippines: EB-1 advances three months to July 1, 2017, EB-2 remains current, and EB-3 creeps forward one week to June 15, 2017
• All Other Countries: EB-1 moves ahead three months to July 1, 2017, EB-2 and EB-3-remain current

NOTE: USCIS has not yet announced if it will accept I-485 applications in December based on the Department of State’s Dates for Filing chart.  However, the trend over the last several months has been to accept employment based I-485 applications based on the Date for Filing chart.