The Department of State released the December 2022 visa bulletin. The visa bulletin summarizes the availability of immigrant visas both for consular processing and adjustment of status applications to be filled in December 2022. The State Department releases both the Final Action Dates and Date of Filing Applications for Employment-Based and Family-Based immigrant visas. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) confirms which chart Applicants must use to file their Adjustment of Status Application (AOS). Below, we break down the movement seen in the December 2022 visa bulletin.
Employment-Based Cases
The State Department along with USCIS has confirmed the preliminary numbers for Fiscal Year (FY) 2023. They are estimating an annual limit of 197,000 visas for FY2023. This is a result of approximately 57,000 unused family-sponsored visa numbers in the previous FY which by law are added to the FY2023 employment-based immigrant visa limit. In comparison to FY2023, in FY2022, the annual limit for employment-based visas was 281,507. As consular offices and embassies abroad are going back to normal processing of immigrant visa cases, the number of unused family-sponsored cases is decreasing. Therefore, the overflow of Employment-Based visas we were all used to post-pandemic is disappearing, requiring a retrogression of dates as we see reflected in the December 2022 visa bulletin.
In the November 2022 visa bulletin, the State Department noted increased demand in EB-1 and EB-2 categories. As the demand increases, and as mentioned above, the number of visas available in FY 2023 decreases compared to FY 2022, retrogression is bound to occur. For the EB-1 category, in the December 2022 visa bulletin, we see visas available worldwide including in India and China. However, the State Department project retrogression of dates for EB-1 India and China in the upcoming months.
Unlike in the EB-1 category, in the EB-2 category, we see retrogression of dates for India. The State Department imposes a cutoff date for worldwide EB-2 applicants to avoid oversubscription of the available visas in FY-2023 in the December 2022 visa bulletin. Excluding Indian and Chinese nationals, all countries are subject to the Final Action Date of November 1, 2022, and the Application Filing Date of December 1, 2022. This is highly unusual since we only see cutoff dates set for EB-2 categories for India and China. For Indian nationals in the EB-2 category in the Final Action Date, the dates retrogressed by more than six months from April 1, 2012, to October 8, 2011, cutoff date. For the Application Filing Date, the cutoff dates remain the same for EB-2 India as May 1, 2012, in December as in November 2022 visa bulletin. For Chinese nationals, both the Final Action Dates and Application Filing Date remain the same as November 2022 visa bulletin as of June 8, 2019.
We see a little bit of good news in the EB-3 category in the December visa bulletin. Visas continue to be available for worldwide nationals in the EB-3 category, excluding India and China. For India, the Final Action Dates advanced by more than two months to June 15, 2012. In the Application Filing Date, the dates again advanced from July 1, 2012, in November to August 1, 2012, in December 2022 visa bulletin. For China, in the Final Action Dates, the cutoff date advanced to August 1, 2018, and the Application Filing Date advanced to September 1, 2018. In both charts, modest but welcomed movement forward.
Family-Based Cases
In the December 2022 visa bulletin, we see no movement in both the Final Action Date chart or the Application Filing Date chat for Family-Sponsored cases. The dates remain unchanged from the November 2022 visa bulletin. For Spouses and Children of Permanent Residents, a visa continues to be immediately available, and the dates are listed as current for all countries. The lack of movement is an indication the U.S. embassies and consulates continue to work to clear the backlog created by COVID-19. The State Department is keeping the dates steady to allow the clearance of the backlog.
We continue to monitor and report predictions and movements related to the monthly visa bulletin. If you have questions regarding your priority date, please feel free to contact us. We put our extensive experience and expertise to work for you to and are with you every step of the way.