USCIS 2026 Alert: 400,000 I-130 Family Petitions Moved from SCOPS to Field Offices

USCIS has officially confirmed through its Q3 2026 report that approximately 400,000 IR I-130 immediate relative family petitions have been reassigned from the Service Center Operations (SCOPS) division to field offices across the country. This large-scale transfer had been widely speculated after posts in federal employee communities surfaced earlier in 2026 hinting at the impending change. The shift primarily affects consular I-130 petitions — those tied to beneficiaries living abroad — which had previously been adjudicated centrally by SCOPS. Moving these cases to local field offices decentralizes the workload and may reflect the agency's effort to redistribute resources amid staffing and policy changes under the current administration. For immigrant families awaiting I-130 decisions, this restructuring could have meaningful implications for processing timelines and case assignment. Field offices operate under different staffing levels and workloads than national service centers, meaning outcomes may vary significantly depending on which local office absorbs a given petition. Applicants with pending IR I-130 cases should monitor their USCIS online account for any changes to their case's assigned location or processing office. Those with cases originally filed at service centers may see their receipt notices reference a different office going forward. While this change directly impacts family-based immigration, it reflects a broader pattern of USCIS operational restructuring in 2026 that employment-based applicants should also track, as similar administrative shifts could eventually affect EB-category processing pipelines.