Premium Processing for Multinational Manager/Executive and National Interest Waiver Petitions
Premium processing is welcome news for I-140 beneficiaries and their sponsoring employers given that many of these cases may have been waiting for several months and even years, preventing thousands of foreign nationals from achieving their permanent residence in the U.S. Newly filed I-140 petitions will continue to remain ineligible for premium processing at this time.
On July 15, 2022, the U.S. Citizenship, and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that EB-1(c) petitions pending since July 1, 2021 (or earlier) and NIW petitions pending since August 1, 2021 (or earlier) will now be eligible for an upgrade to premium processing.
Beginning August 1, 2022, the USCIS will accept Form I-907 premium processing requests for:
- EB-1(c) multinational executive and manager petitions received on or before July 1, 2021; and
- E21 NIW petitions received on or before August 1, 2021.
The filing fee to upgrade a pending EB-1(c) or NIW I-140 to premium processing will be $2,500, the same fee that currently applies to other classifications of I-140s that are already eligible for premium processing. The USCIS will reject any premium processing requests submitted prior to August 1, 2022 in connection with the newly eligible subset of petitions.
The USCIS will adjudicate (issue an approval, request for evidence, notice of intent to deny, or denial) EB-1(c) and NIW petitions within 45 days of receiving the premium upgrade request for the pending I-140 petition.
However, the USCIS ensures that the expansion of premium processing will not lead to an increase in the processing time for any immigration benefit requests filed under regular processing.
Also, the USCIS will no longer accept the I-907 version dated 09/30/20 from July 1, 2022 onwards. Form I-907 version dated as 05/31/22 will only be acceptable.
