EB-3 Weekly Briefing: June 29 – July 5, 2026

Week in Review: June 29 – July 5, 2026

This was a consequential week for employment-based immigration, with a federal court striking down USCIS policies that had frozen adjudications for nationals of 39 countries, a Supreme Court decision reshaping Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for seven nations, and new prevailing wage benchmarks taking effect that will touch PERM (Program Electronic Review Management) filings nationwide. For EB-3 green card applicants, the developments span every stage of the process — from labor certification through adjustment of status.

Visa Bulletin Update

The Department of State (DOS) released the June 2026 Visa Bulletin (Volume XI, No. 15), which governs July adjudications. For fiscal year 2026, the worldwide employment-based visa limit holds at 140,000 annually, with a per-country cap of approximately 25,620 visas (7% of the combined family and employment totals). Oversubscribed countries remain China, India, Mexico, and the Philippines.

Looking ahead, a community predictive model widely followed on Reddit's r/USCIS has published its August 2026 forecast ahead of the official release expected within about one week. For EB-3 India, the model predicts a modest one-month advance to a Final Action Date of January 31, 2014 — incremental but in the right direction. EB-2 India, however, is projected to remain Unavailable for August after exhausting its per-country annual allocation in July. The EB-2 India filing date is held at January 15, 2015. Applicants in that category should watch for the October 1 fiscal year reset, when a new annual allocation typically restores some movement.

For EB-3 applicants from countries outside the oversubscribed group — the rest of the world — per-country cap dynamics are far less of a constraint, and movement tends to be more predictable.

USCIS Processing Times

A community analysis of public USCIS data published this week puts the current I-485 (Adjustment of Status) backlog at approximately 1.33 million pending cases nationwide. The headline figure for EB-3 applicants: a 92% approval rate once cases are actually adjudicated — one of the strongest rates across all immigrant categories. That's the good news.

The concern is pace. Adjudications have slowed roughly 3x over the past several months. For EB-3 applicants already enduring long waits for their priority date to become current, this processing slowdown means that even after the Visa Bulletin opens a window, the actual green card interview or approval can lag significantly behind.

Geographically, the heaviest backlogs are concentrated in South Florida: the Kendall field office leads with approximately 38,000 pending cases, Hialeah follows at 32,000, and Tampa at 22,000. If you filed through one of these offices, build extra time into your planning horizon.

PERM Labor Certification

A significant update for employers and applicants in the early stages of the EB-3 pipeline: the Department of Labor's Office of Foreign Labor Certification (OFLC) issued Technical Release Notes on June 29, 2026, implementing updated Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) prevailing wage data for the period July 2026 through June 2027.

This annual wage update directly affects the PERM process. Any PERM application filed on or after the effective date must comply with the newly established prevailing wages for the relevant occupation and geographic area. If your offered wage was set based on last year's data, your employer may need to reassess whether it still meets the new threshold before filing. Cases in early stages — where a Prevailing Wage Determination (PWD) request has not yet been submitted to OFLC — are most exposed to this shift. Employers with active sponsorships should pull the updated OEWS figures for their specific SOC code and location now, rather than discovering a gap at filing time.

Separately, a proposed expansion of Form AR-11 — the mandatory address-change notification all foreign nationals must file within 10 days of moving — drew attention this week. USCIS's proposed revision would require filers to disclose detailed employment information, immigration history, and government benefits received. Critically, USCIS has indicated it would cross-check AR-11 data against visa petitions and I-9 records. Any inconsistency — even a variation in how an employer's name is formatted — could invite additional scrutiny. The public comment window closes July 6, 2026 via Regulations.gov (Docket No. USCIS-2008-0018). EB-3 workers and sponsoring employers should be aware this form carries penalties of up to $5,000 and potential deportation for noncompliance or inaccuracies under existing rules.

Policy & Legislative Updates

Federal court vacates 39-country adjudication pause. The most significant development of the week for EB-3 applicants: a federal district court in Rhode Island issued a ruling on June 5, 2026 (reported widely this week), vacating four USCIS policies that had placed blanket holds on adjudications — including I-485, Employment Authorization Documents (EADs), Advance Parole, naturalization, and asylum-related decisions — for nationals of 39 countries. The court found USCIS exceeded its authority and violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). It also struck down a policy directing officers to treat country of origin as a negative discretionary factor in case outcomes.

For EB-3 applicants from those 39 countries, this ruling could unblock long-stalled I-485 applications and associated work permits. However, the practical impact remains uncertain: USCIS has not yet issued implementation guidance, and the government is expected to seek either a stay of the ruling or appeal it. Either move could delay real-world relief significantly. Watch for USCIS announcements closely.

Supreme Court rules on TPS, reshaping work authorization for seven countries. The Supreme Court's June 25, 2026 decision in Mullin v. Doe granted DHS broad — and largely unreviewable — authority to terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designations. Following the ruling, USCIS extended TPS-based Employment Authorization Documents (EADs) for nationals of Burma (Myanmar), Ethiopia, Haiti, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria, and Yemen through July 10, 2026 as a temporary compliance placeholder for I-9, E-Verify, and SAVE (Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements) purposes.

This July 10 date is not a definitive termination — district court injunctions remain active for Haiti and Syria, and those may extend protection past that date. Employers should not treat July 10 as an automatic cutoff for employment authorization and should follow country-specific USCIS guidance before taking any re-verification or adverse employment action. For EB-3 applicants who concurrently hold TPS and rely on TPS-based EADs while their green card case is pending, monitoring USCIS's country-specific TPS pages daily is essential during this fluid period.

A broader consequence of Mullin v. Doe: by removing most judicial review of TPS terminations, the ruling heightens uncertainty not just for the seven countries named above, but for TPS holders from El Salvador, Ukraine, Venezuela, and other designated countries who can no longer rely on court challenges as a backstop.

What This Means for Your EB-3 Case

Several actionable items surface from this week's developments:

If you're from one of the 39 countries affected by the adjudication pause: Watch USCIS's website for implementation guidance following the Rhode Island court ruling. If your I-485 or EAD has been dormant, this could be the development that restores movement — but don't assume it automatically applies without agency confirmation.

If you hold TPS alongside a pending EB-3 petition: Do not let your documentation lapse. Verify the current expiration date on your EAD matches USCIS's latest guidance (currently July 10, 2026), and monitor for further extensions as court proceedings evolve.

If your PERM filing is upcoming or in progress: The new OFLC prevailing wage data is now live. Have your employer verify that the offered wage still meets the updated threshold for your SOC code and geographic area. This is a compliance check worth doing immediately — wage shortfalls discovered after filing are far more costly to address.

If you're tracking your I-485 and it's taking longer than expected: The 3x slowdown in adjudication pace is real and documented. Check whether your case is pending at one of the high-backlog Florida offices. Use USCIS's official Case Status Online tool at egov.uscis.gov as your authoritative source. A community-discovered API endpoint at my.uscis.gov may also show case location data, but treat it as supplementary — undocumented APIs can change without notice and should never replace official channels.

For EB-3 India applicants: August Visa Bulletin movement of one month is modest but consistent with the long-term trend. If your priority date is approaching January 2014, verify it against the official August bulletin when it publishes within the next week.

This post is generated from immigration news published during the week of June 29 – July 5, 2026. Information is for reference only. Verify all details with official USCIS, DOL, and DOS sources.