US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced the automatic extension period for Employment Authorization Documents (“EADs”) when form the current 180 days to 540 days. The temporary increase will apply, form the April 8, 2024 date of Federal Register publication, to any cases filed after October 27, 2023 and not yet adjudicated, as well as any cases filed between April 8 and September 30, 2024

Automatic Extension apply to certain types of EAD where an application to extend was “timely filed” (received by USCIS before the current expiration date) but not approved by the expiration of the current card.  The intent is to avoid gaps in employment eligibility – previously, even with a timely filed extension application, the applicant would need to stop work if the case was not approved and a new EAD card received by the expiration date.  Automatic extensions solved this issue for eligible applicants, at leas tup to 180 days past the expiration date.

While a benefit to applicants and their employers, this increase in the automatic extension period speaks to (and serves as just a band-aid for) a bigger problem – the increasing length of adjudications of these EAD extension applications.