What Are The Next Steps?

You’ve decided to apply for an EB-1A visa and have signed on with Lisonbee Immigration Law to help gather your evidence, craft your strategy, and prepare your compelling petition. You are already off to a great start, but what are the next steps? This is a question we hear often from our clients. The EB-1A process is something of a marathon, taking several months to complete, so it is understandable that it often feels overwhelming, especially at the beginning. In this blog post, we will discuss each step of the anticipated timeline we share with all of our clients when they first begin working with our firm. Please note, many factors are at play while we are working on your case and so the timeline is merely a guideline and not set in stone. 

1. You will be assigned a legal writer. A legal writer will be assigned your case and asked to initiate the process to get you going. This will include setting up a secure and private Google Drive with specific folders and instructions to help you gather all of your evidence into one location. They will send you a questionnaire to be filled out at your earliest convenience and set you up for a kick-off meeting. In this meeting you will meet your legal writer, and along with an attorney from our firm, we will discuss case strategy and answer any questions you may have. You will be given some homework at this time. You will be asked to upload all of your evidence into your Google Drive, draft a personal statement, provide information regarding individuals who have confirmed they will sign letters of recommendation for you, and fill out that questionnaire we mentioned earlier. The timeline (as shown below) cannot begin on our end until all of these tasks have been completed. The sooner these tasks are completed, the sooner your legal writer can begin working on your case.

2. Your legal writer assesses your evidence and drafts your letters of recommendation. With all of your evidence before them and information about your letter writers in hand, your legal writer will begin drafting letters of recommendation (LORs) to accompany your petition. These letters are a critical part of your case and will provide probative evidence to USCIS to support different aspects of your petition. This process ideally takes about 2-3 weeks. After the initial drafting, your LORs will be reviewed by an attorney to ensure they align with our firm’s case strategy for your petition. The LORs will then be sent your way for your review. Often the letter drafts will include prompts and questions for you to answer in order to provide information we feel will bolster your case. Please address these questions as fully as possible. We wouldn’t ask if we didn’t think it was important. You will then have your LORs signed by those who agreed to do so. This is a point in which the process can bottleneck if there is a delay in uploading the signed letters.

   
   

3. Drafting the Support Letter, etc. While you are gathering signatures, your legal writer will be working behind the scenes to continue gathering supporting evidence, filling out the appropriate forms, and drafting a support letter. This support letter is a rather long document which discusses your area of extraordinary ability, how you will substantially benefit the United States, your eligibility for the specific criteria we are arguing, and how you have demonstrated your extraordinary ability and achieved sustained national and international acclaim. As you can imagine, this takes quite a bit of time to put together. We aim for it to take about 3-4 weeks to complete this task. Once all of your letters have been signed and uploaded, all other evidence gathered, forms filled out, and a support letter drafted, your legal writer will assemble a full case draft.

   
   

4. First Internal Review. Once your legal writer has assembled everything together into a full petition, it is ready for first review by our firm’s review team. The reviewer will objectively review each portion of your case draft to make sure that your case is as strong as it can be, providing suggestions to your legal writer to improve different aspects and to correct any mistakes. Review times vary depending on the length and nature of the case, but we aim to get each case reviewed within a 2 week period.

   
   

5. Client Review. After your legal writer has made any suggested changes to your case draft, they will forward it to you for your one and only review. We ask that you review it carefully and thoroughly at this time. We will have you provide suggestions, ask questions, and point out any inaccuracies within your case. Most clients take 2-3 days to review and sign all of the necessary documents needed. Your legal writer will make any necessary changes to your draft before sending it for final review and filing.

   
   

6. Final Internal Review and Filing. After taking your suggestions and corrections into consideration, your legal writer will submit your full petition to a firm attorney for their final review and filing. They will make any further revisions deemed necessary to further strengthen your case, and then sign it. Then your case is printed, boxed, and shipped. Once shipped, your legal writer will notify you to let you know it is on its way to USCIS.

   
   

7. Receipt. USCIS will send us a receipt notice email when they have received your petition. We will forward this notice to you as soon as we receive it. The notice will contain a case number which you will be able to use to track the progress of your case at USCIS. 

   
   

8. Decision. If you have elected premium processing, a decision on your case will be made within 15 business days of the date on the receipt notice. If all goes as we hoped, we will receive an email notifying us that your case has been approved. We will forward the good news to you as soon as possible! If your priority date is current, we can begin the Adjustment of Status (AOS) process right away and our firm will assign you a legal writer that is highly knowledgeable in that process. If your priority date isn’t current, we will continue to monitor the Visa bulletin and extend our AOS services once it’s current.

   Other less common outcomes could include having a Request for Further Evidence (RFE), a Notice of Intent to Deny (NOID), or other action from USCIS sent to you and our firm. If these unfavorable circumstances arise, we will be in touch with you to discuss what we can do to continue moving towards an EB-1A approval.

   
   

Our firm is dedicated to helping you succeed! Our legal team is experienced at navigating USCIS nuances and trends. We specialize in drafting persuasive petitions that emphasize your extraordinary ability and put you in the best possible position to achieve your goal. The path isn’t always smooth and sometimes takes a few twists and turns before we get to the finish line, but you can be assured that our team will be with you every step of the way. We know that this is a significant time for you and we appreciate the trust you have placed in us.

If you are interested in our support with an EB-1A petition, we encourage you to book a consultation with our firm: Book a Consultation | Lisonbee Immigration

This post is part 11 of a new 17-week series published every Wednesday. Each post is written by a different employee of Lisonbee Immigration Law about a immigration topic of their choosing. This post was written by legal writer Stacey Miller.