Last
week’s October
2021 Visa Bulletin was hotly anticipated.
Over the summer it became apparent that the 140,000 employment based
visa quota would
at least double in fiscal year 2022, which starts October 1, 2021. The expectation was that IV dates would leap
forward.
And
yet when the October 2021 was released not only did the dates stay the same,
but the VB included a note at the end,
Employment Third:
Worldwide:
A final action date could be imposed as early as November
China: A
retrogression of this date could occur as early as November
India: A
retrogression of this date could occur as early as November
Mexico:
A final action date could be imposed as early as November
Philippines:
A final action date could be imposed as early as November
With
that we now expect retrogression in all EB categories starting in November. Charlie
Oppenheim, who runs creates each month’s Visa Bulletin for the Department of
State, said as much in his monthly You
Tube video broadcast.
There
appears to be two reasons for this change in expectation:
-There
were many more I-485, Adjustments of Status filed in FY 2020 than anyone in the
DOS expected. Likewise, the USCIS is
approving more I-485s. This is a
disappointing answer because most of these I-485s were filed in October and
November 2020. This insight should have
been apparent much earlier.
-The
Department of State knows that their overseas consulates and embassies have the
ability to dramatically increase processing of consular processed visas. This is good news for overseas for consular
processed immigrant visas, like nurses, because it implies that the DOS is
holding back immigrant visas instead of allowing the entire quota to be used by
AOS cases. On the other hand, it is surely
disappointing if you are in the US awaiting a visa.
MU
Law’s interpretation is that if the overseas consulates and embassies do
not dramatically increase their visa issuance, that these visas should be put
back into the AOS queue later in FY 2022.
