TheDepartment of State expects that there will be “significant advancement” inmany categories, including all EB-1s and EB-5s, as well as EB-3 Worldwide andPhilippines, starting in FY 2021 (October 2020 Visa Bulletin). This is terrificnews for all EB IV applicants.
The news come from the Department ofState’s Charlie Oppenhiem, who is always gracious with his time. Charlie’s monthly AILA Q&As, Check In With Charlie, are always informative. This month’s Check In contained manyinteresting answers, including answers to questions posed by MU attorneys.
Charlie expects that the Family-BasedImmigrant Visa category will be underused by about 60,000 visas, as a result ofslowdowns in processing related to COVID-19. US law says that when the FB IV does not meet its quota, all of thosevisa flow into the Employment-Based category in the next fiscal year. Therefore, Charlie expects the EB category toincrease from 140,000 to about 200,000 visas in FY 2021.
This means that the per country quotas,which are normally about 10,000 IVs, will increase to approximately 14,000 IVsper country. It is this increase in EBvisas that will lead to the dramatic progressions in October 2020.
Charlie also helpfully explained thatwhile he could have progressed the Visa Bulletin more aggressively in June andJuly, he did not do so because “processing capacity at both consular posts andUSCIS is diminished due to the pandemic.” Therefore, Visa Bulletin progressions would not have meant increasedvisa umber usage and may have resulted in a future retrogression, which he tries to avoid.