US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced an update to its policy manual allowing validity periods of up to five years for Employment Authorization Documents (EADs) issued for certain categories.

These categories include those admitted or paroled as refugees, those granted asylum, asylum applicants, withholding of removal recipients and those applying for withholding of removal, those granted suspension of deportation, those granted withholding of removal, and perhaps of the most use to our clients’ applicants for adjustment of status under section 245.  The change applies both to initial applications and to renewals.

The guidance clarifies that several of the categories here are authorized to work “incident to status” – meaning that they aren’t actually required to apply for or present an Employment Authorization Document at all; an I-94 reflecting status along with an acceptable identity document is sufficient to demonstrate employment authorization and complete an I-9 form to accept employment.

The clarification of categories not needing an EAD, as well as the extended validity period, are helpful.  The primary reason for this move, however, is to try to reduce USCIS’ workload in adjudicating the I-765 forms used to apply for initial and renewal work authorizations rather than to make life more convenient for applicants.  In the many situations where the EAD is issued to cover an individual’s ability to work while waiting for adjudication of some other application (asylum, Adjustment of Status, etc.), the best solution would be accelerating those adjudications so the interim EADs are no longer necessary.