Recently, the US government proposed a bill allowing Green Card applicants through employment-based visas to jump the queue by paying a supplemental fee. The Employment-based Visa categories are facing significant backlogs due to pandemic-related restrictions and arbitrary visa caps based on the country of the applicant. These categories allow the applicant to live and work permanently in the US by allowing them to become US permanent residents.
A sizable number of East Indian IT professionals are stuck in the Green Card backlog waiting for their turn. However, if this bill is implemented, they would be able to expedite the processing of their applications by paying a supplemental fee.
What Is the Reconciliation Bill?
The US House Judiciary Committee recently released the Reconciliation Bill. If implemented, this bill will allow people affected by the country caps on employment-based visa categories to obtain a Green Card by paying a fee of $5000. Every year, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) offers 140,000 employment-based visas. There is a country cap of 7%, meaning that only 7% of the total visas can be issued to applicants from a single country. This means that applicants from countries with high immigration rates to the US have to wait for years sometimes to get their Green Card.
How Will the Reconciliation Bill Work?
According to the Reconciliation Bill, an employment-based visa with a “priority date more than 2 years before” can pay a supplemental fee of $5000 to adjust their status to permanent residence in the US. A priority date is a date when the USCIS received your petition for a Green Card. Applicants to the EB-5 Immigrant Investor Visa category will be required to pay a supplemental fee of $50,000 to expedite their Green Card.
