Recently, an Indian-American student asked Vice President J.D. Vance at a Turning Point USA event what steps the Trump administration was taking to ease the long waiting list for Indians to obtain green cards in the United States. The 20-year-old woman introduced herself as the daughter of Indian immigrant parents on an H-1B visa and is still waiting for permanent residency in the United States. The conversation went viral, with J.D. Vance praising his Indian in-laws and talking about how immigrant communities should think about America first, rather than the country they originally belonged to. An interesting part of the conversation was that the woman said that under the Biden administration, it would take about 150 years for an Indian to get a green card. With the Donald Trump administration known for its anti-immigration stance, here’s how long it will take for an Indian to get a green card in the US.EB-2 (Common for people with a master’s degree or higher): The final action date is around July 15, 2014, which means if your priority date was before that, you’d be eligible now. Therefore, if someone applies for a green card within this quota, they will need to wait 11 to 12 years to receive a visa number, plus additional processing time. EB-3 (Bachelor + Technical Job): Final action date is around November 15, 2013. The waiting time for new applicants is approximately 12 to 15 years. These two are the most common ways for H-1B Indians to obtain green cards, and due to huge demand, there is a large backlog. The existing waiting time for both categories averages 25-30 years.
The waiting time for a green card is “150 years”
The “150-year wait time” stems from an analysis by the Cato Institute, which said in a 2023 report that 400,000 Indian workers in the United States hoping to obtain employment-based green cards face a 134-year wait. The United States has an annual cap of 140,000 employment visas, and each country has a 7% quota. The study said there are 1.8 million backlog cases, 1.1 million of which are from India. “New applicants from India will face a lifetime wait, and more than 400,000 people will die before receiving a green card,” the report said.Wait times vary based on various factors. Many applicants upgrade from EB-3 or EB-2 to EB-1, which is a faster path and frees up some spots. Some choose the EB-5 category for U.S. investors. Some eventually left the cohort and settled in other countries.