Overview
- DHS published a proposed rule on Oct. 14, 2026 that would delete the regulation requiring USCIS to give weight to its own earlier approvals and opened a public comment period that closes Nov. 13, 2026.
- The agency estimates the change could touch about 208,429 petitions each year and would apply across H-1B, L-1, O-1, TN and E nonimmigrant categories with H-1B filings making up the largest share of affected I-129 petitions.
- DHS projects the rule could generate roughly 6,044 additional requests for evidence annually, which the agency says would likely slow adjudications, complicate travel and visa stamping, and push more extension cases toward the 240-day continued-work limit for timely-filed petitions.
- DHS frames the proposal as restoring the petitioner’s legal burden of proof by removing a rule that it says can discourage officers from seeking missing documentation and that could allow questionable prior approvals to carry undue weight.
- Deference has shifted several times in recent years—first issued by USCIS in 2004, rescinded in 2017, reinstated in 2021 and codified in the 2024 H-1B Modernization Rule—so stakeholders now expect a comment-driven rulemaking process before any final change takes effect and before USCIS departs from current practice.