The United States Citizenship & Immigration Services ("USCIS") has announced that on June 16, 2008, it will begin accepting premium processing requests for I-140 immigrant petitions filed on behalf of certain H-1B nonimmigrants who are nearing the end of their six-year limit of stay. The USCIS' premium processing service offers 15-day adjudication of certain I-140 petitions upon payment of a $1000 government fee.
The USCIS will accept requests for I-140 premium processing for beneficiaries who as of the date of filing the I-907 premium processing request form:
- Are currently in H-1B nonimmigrant status;
- Will reach their sixth-year of H-1B status within sixty (60) days;
- Are only eligible for further extension of H-1B status under section §104(c) of the American Competitiveness in the Twenty-First Century Act ("AC21"); and
- Are ineligible to extend their H-1B status under section §106(a) of AC21.
Qualified foreign nationals with priority dates earlier than the cut-off dates below, or where noted as "current", may file, or be approved, for an adjustment of status application in the month of May 2008. They may also be approved for an immigrant visa abroad:
How This Affects You:
The USCIS will permit premium service only to those nearing the end of their H-1B six-year limit, and cannot otherwise benefit from AC21 given lengthy PERM and I-140 government processing. Premium processing service will be expanded under these very limited circumstances only. Note that I-140 petitions filed under the National Interest Waiver category remain ineligible for premium processing service.
The agency says that allowing I-140 petitions to request premium processing will exceed its capacity to provide timely 15-day adjudication.
We will provide further information as soon as it becomes available.
The full May 2008 Visa Bulletin is available at the link below:
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