VISA BULLETIN PROJECTIONS FOR 2013

by Chris Musillo

Charles Oppenheim of the Department of State is the person most responsible for each month’s Visa Bulletin.  In a conversation with AILA, Mr. Oppenheim recently discussed projections for future Visa Bulletins.  MU Law has spoken with Mr. Oppenheim several times in the past and have always found that his projections are well thought out and very accurate.

Here are some important notes from that conversation:

• India EB2 will see very little movement in the foreseeable future.  Many immigrant visa applicants with old India EB3s are recapturing these dates in subsequent EB2 applications, thereby holding back the progression of India EB2.  Current numbers indicate that there are approximately 42,000 India EB2 cases in line with priority dates prior to May 2010.  These numbers cannot account for future upgraded India EB3s.
• The USCIS and DOS have pre-adjudicated 44,000 India EB-3 Applications with priority dates before August 2007.  Therefore it will be several years before India EB-3 progresses beyond that date.
• There are 12,000 India EB3 cases with priority dates before January 2004, which means that India EB3 will not improve into 2004 for at least one or two years.
• Worldwide EB-3 has 42,000 pre-adjudicated cases with priority dates before March 2007.  Still, the Worldwide EB-3 date is May 2007.  Mr. Oppenheim did not say it, but it reasonable follows that many of these 42,000 Worldwide EB-3s likely have been abandoned.

·         Because it is impossible to predict how many EB2s are upgraded to EB2, it is nearly impossible to predict future dates.  For instance, Worldwide EB3 had 1,100 upgrades in December 2012.  In 2007, there were only 72 upgrades for the entire year. 

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Comments

[Bryan Training]

It's gonna be a long wait then. Still, there's a hope.

[Chris Musillo]

@Backlogged - no real information on Family numbers other than that Family demand is higher this year and so it will move slower in future months.

[Backlogged]

Chris, any mention on family based visa movement,especially F2A? Or the fact on the effect of spillover of FB to EB from FY2012?

[Chris Musillo]

@ Ian - Unfortunately nothing specific about the Phils.

[Ian]

Hi Chris,

Did Mr. Oppenheim mention anything about EB3 Philippines?

Thanks,
Ian

[Chris Musillo]

It could but I wouldn't read too much into it. Also, it is unclear at this time how much if any spillover there will be from FB.

[jkl]

Does it mean that EB3ROW could be advanced faster soon? Also this article , does it take into acount the spillower of visa number from FB that recently everybody is talking about ono the internet? Any comment? Thank you.