A blog about U.S. immigration matters by Paul Szeto, a former INS attorney and an experienced immigration lawyer. We serve clients in all U.S. states and overseas countries. (All information is not legal advice and is subject to change without prior notice.)

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Monday, July 14, 2014

Visa Bulletin Predictions by Charlie Oppenheim - July 2014

State Department's Charlie Oppenheim made the following predictions to AILA regarding the Visa Bulletin after the release of the August 2014 bulletin:

Family Immigration:
Family 2A (spouses and minor children of permanent residents): The F2A cut-off date will advance in September from May 2012 a few months to fall 2012. The number of cases in this visa category with current priority dates has declined.

Employment Immigration:
EB-3 China: This category has started to advance in August after two months of retrogression.  The prediction is that it will continue to advance. The number of "downgrade" cases has decreased and there are also spill-over visa numbers from family immigration.

EB-2 India: This category will retrogress as early as November for Fiscal Year 2015. The prediction, according to Mr. Oppenheim, is based on "a number of variables such as historical demand patterns, expected future demand patterns, expected return rates of unused numbers, information received from USCIS on expected processing, and National Visa Center (NVC) petition processing trends." 


EB-5 China:  This category will likely no longer be current in FY2015.  A cut-off date will be established as early as June 2015 but no later than August 2015 due to ever-increasing demands and faster USCIS approvals.

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