Foreign nationals and their sponsoring US employers eagerly await the monthly release of the US Department of State (DOS) Visa Bulletin, to confirm when they will be eligible to apply for permanent residence in the US. In the April 2026 Visa Bulletin, the DOS announced the welcome end of certain visa processing queues and additional other relief from visa availability backlogs. For the first time in years, priority dates in the employment-based second and third preference (EB-2 and EB-3) categories of the Dates for Filing chart became “current,” indicating that there was no processing queue or wait time to be eligible to obtain immigrant visas abroad or to adjust status to permanent residence in the United States. US employers praised the DOS move and began to prepare applications for Adjustment of Status (AOS) to permanent residence to file at US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on behalf of sponsored employees.
But in the following two months, USCIS changed the music again and hit the dance floor with its own attention-getting move, announcing that despite priority dates remaining current in certain EB-2 and EB-3 categories of the Dates for Filing chart in the May and June 2026 Visa Bulletins, the agency instead would be using the Final Action Dates chart to determine who is eligible to file an AOS application. This announcement—the agency equivalent of a needle scratch—stopped some of the motion brought on by the DOS moves in April 2026, because priority dates had not advanced nearly as significantly in the Final Action Dates charts in April, May, or June in the EB-3 “all other countries” category. The priority dates remained the same, but USCIS changed the music so those current dates could no longer dance. This decision set off a frenzy to file EB-3 AOS cases at USCIS before May 1, 2026 when the Final Action Dates chart would be in use for the foreseeable future. The EB-2 “all other countries” category remains current in the final action chart through June.
The May and June 2026 Visa Bulletins are a good reminder to US employers that various agencies play a part in the employer-sponsored permanent residence process and that no single agency is the only decisionmaker in this multi-step process. Like any spring dance, there is good reason to expect a mix of slow and fast pacing and a variety of partners with a range of moves designed to make you dance. US employers are urged to continue sponsoring foreign nationals and trust the process, because the dance and the moves required will continue to evolve whether employers choose to dance or not.
Please see our article on the March Visa Bulletin for a detailed explanation of priority dates and the various categories and charts: https://www.clarkhill.com/news-events/news/march-2026-visa-bulletin-spring-forward/.
For more information on how employer-sponsored case processing may be impacted by the Visa Bulletin, please contact a member of the Clark Hill Immigration team.
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