October Visa Bulletin Released: EB-1 Current; Family Based Retrogression; Regional Center EB-5 Unavailable

The highly anticipated October 2016 Visa Bulletin was released today. As expected visa availability for the EB-1 category moved to current for all countries. EB-2 visa availability moved to current for the Global, Mexico, and Philippines numbers. China EB-3 availability moved up to January 22, 2013 priority dates. There was no significant movement forward in EB-3 visa availability for other country categories.
Family based visa availability moved backward for most categories. F-1 numbers retrogressed one year for Global, China, and India numbers. F-2 and F-3 numbers retrogressed one year for all countries. F-4 numbers also retrogressed by one year for Global, China, Mexico and Philippines numbers. F-4 numbers moved backward from May 1, 2004 in the September Bulletin to December 1, 2002.
Visa numbers for Regional Center EB-5s were noted as unavailable. The Bulletin explained the Regional Center numbers are listed as unavailable because the legislation authorizing the program is set to expire. The Bulletin notes that Regional Center immigrant visas will not be issued overseas nor will final action be taken on pending adjustment of status applications after September 30, 2016.
The October 2016 Visa Bulletin can be viewed at: https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/law-and-policy/bulletin/2017/visa-bulletin-for-october-2016.html EMPLOYMENT-BASED PREFERENCES

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