Green cards will become more easily available for the majority of people trying to immigrate to the US via one of the employment-based US visa categories, from the beginning of next month. In the October edition of the Visa Bulletin put out by the State Department, the announcement was made that from 1 October, the agency will be processing EB-1 category requests for all nations of birth.
The EB-1 category includes multinational executives and managers, outstanding researchers and professors and all aliens with extraordinary ability, no matter which country they were born in. In the summer, the State Department admitted that there was a sizeable backlog for EB-1 US visa immigrants born in India and mainland China.
The EB-2 US visa category, designed for aliens with exceptional ability and professionals with advanced degrees, will also become immediately available at the beginning of next month, except for immigrants born in India and China. That category is backlogged to 15 January and 15 February 2012 respectively.
The EB-3 US visa category, targeted at skilled workers and professionals, has only a limited degree of availability regardless of birth nation. The backlog for this category is to 1 June this year, and the process of immigration is not expected to slow down as a result. The EB-5 US visa category, aimed at investors, is currently available for all birth countries other than mainland China, which is where most EB-5 US visa immigrants are born.