USCIS Issues Employment Authorization & Advance Parole Card

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) announced on February 11, 2011, that it is now issuing employment and travel authorization on a single card for certain applicants filing an Application to Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status, Form I-485.

The card looks similar to the current Employment Authorization Document (“EAD”) but will include text that reads, “Serves as I-512 Advance Parole”. A card with this text will serve as both an employment authorization and Advance Parole document.

An adjustment applicant must file the Forms I-765 and I-131 at the same time in order to receive an EAD and Advance Parole card. The applicant should make sure that his or her name and address appear identically on Forms I-765 and I-131 that he or she files concurrently with the I-485 application in order to receive the new card.

Obtaining the advance parole does not guarantee re-entry into the United States after a trip abroad. This card authorizes parole, not admission, to the U.S. Parole is not an admission or “entry”. If an applicant obtains this card, he or she may use it to travel abroad and return to the U.S. Upon arriving at a port-of-entry, the applicant should present the card to a Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”) Officer to request parole. Issuance of an Advance Parole document does not guarantee that CBP will parole the adjustment applicant into the U.S. If parole is granted, the applicant will be permitted to come into the U.S. as a parolee, but will not have been legally “admitted”. Individuals who have been unlawfully present in the U.S. and subsequently depart and seek re-entry through a grant of parole may be inadmissible and ineligible to adjust their status.

To read more information about the new card, and to read questions and answers about it, visit this USCIS website.

Source: USCIS

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Ruchi Thaker

Ruchi Thaker is New York City-based immigration attorney with extensive experience and excellent reputation for effective legal representation in simple and difficult immigration cases. I have experience in areas of deportation defense (criminal and non-criminal), federal court litigation, representation on appeals and motions with the immigration courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals, family-based immigration, asylum, naturalization, and consular processing.