On August 13, 2026, the Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) issued a decision that reverses fourteen years of settled immigration law and could affect many people who are pursuing a green card from inside the United States. The case is Matter of Delcarmen-Lara, 29 I&N Dec. 830 (BIA 2026).
The short version: if you have accrued a year or more of “unlawful presence” in the United States and you leave the country using advance parole, that trip now counts as a “departure” that can trigger the ten-year bar to being admitted back and that bar can block your green card application. Under the rule that had been in place, advance parole travel did not have this effect.
The Board said it will apply the new rule going forward rather than retroactively. That is meaningful for trips already taken, though the decision leaves important questions about how that works unanswered. For anyone planning to travel, the calculus has changed significantly.
What is Advance Parole?
Advance parole is permission from the Department of Homeland Security to leave the United States and be allowed back in, granted to people who do not have a visa or green card that would let them travel normally. It is commonly used by:
- DACA recipients
- People with a pending Form I-485 application to adjust status to permanent resident
- Certain people with pending humanitarian applications
For years, advance parole has been treated as the safe way for these individuals to visit a sick relative, attend a funeral, or travel for work or study without jeopardizing their case.
What is changing?
In 2012, in a case called Matter of Arrabally and Yerrabelly, 25 I&N Dec. 771 (BIA 2012), the BIA held that leaving the country on advance parole was not a “departure” for purposes of the ten-year bar. The Board’s reasoning was practical: a person who travels on advance parole leaves with the government’s advance blessing and the expectation of returning to continue a pending green card case. This type of departure was different from someone simply leaving the country.
Arrabally became a cornerstone of adjustment-of-status practice. It is the reason attorneys have been able to tell clients with long periods of unlawful presence that advance parole travel would not destroy their green card eligibility.
With this new decision, someone with more than a year of unlawful presence who travels on advance parole:
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Will trigger the ten-year unlawful presence bar
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Will still be paroled and satisfy the “inspected and admitted or paroled” entry requirement for adjustment of status under section 245(a)
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But the person will now be inadmissible and a pending or future adjustment application can be denied on that basis
Waivers are available but they require proving extreme hardship to a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident spouse or parent. The provisional waiver process using Form I-601A is designed for people who typically complete their case at a consulate abroad, not for people adjusting status in the United States. Whether a waiver is available in any given case is a fact-specific question.
What Happens Now?
Several things remain unsettled:
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Circuit courts: How the federal courts of appeals respond is unresolved.
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USCIS implementation: USCIS may implement guidance and explanation on how it will handle applications already on file and travel already completed.
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Further review: Decisions of this significance are sometimes revisited by the Attorney General, the courts, or Congress.
Can I still travel on advance parole?
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Do not travel on advance parole without legal advice, even if you have traveled on advance parole before without incident.
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Gather documentation of every period you have spent in the United States, with and without status, and every entry and exit. Your unlawful presence total is the number that drives this analysis.
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If you have a trip already planned, get it reviewed before you go. The cost of a consultation is not comparable to the cost of a ten-year bar.
Questions? Email Attorney Natalia Meade at nmeade@psbplaw.com.
