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By Billal Rahman
Immigration Reporter
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More than 1.5 million green card applications were pending across the United States at the end of June, according to government figures.
Data from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) shows 1,560,290 Form I-485 applications were pending as of June 30.
Form I-485 allows eligible immigrants already in the United States to apply for permanent resident status, also known as a green card. Pending applications are those USCIS has received but has not yet decided.
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USCIS is the federal agency responsible for administering the country’s immigration system, processing applications for green cards, citizenship, work permits, asylum, and other immigration benefits.
The figures reveal where the backlog is concentrated as the Trump administration continues its crackdown on legal immigration and tightens scrutiny of people seeking immigration benefits. The data covers the three-month period from April 1 to June 30, 2026.
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What the Data Shows
Newsweek created this map to show where pending green card applications were concentrated across USCIS field offices.
Florida had one of the largest concentrations of pending applications, with 265,495 cases spread across nine USCIS field offices, according to agency data. Tampa had 46,609 pending applications, followed by Kendall with 45,973 and Hialeah with 43,153, per the data.
Texas field offices had 140,743 pending cases, including 57,601 in Houston, 38,257 in Dallas, and 30,622 in San Antonio.
California's field offices had 161,398 pending applications. San Jose recorded 23,633, Los Angeles 20,529, and San Francisco 18,364.
USCIS reports cases by the office handling them, not necessarily where the applicant lives. The map only includes USCIS field offices.
The figures should not be read as a count of green card applicants living in each state, as USCIS reports cases by the office or service center handling them. The map includes field offices only, while service centers, which process applications from across the country, are excluded because their locations do not necessarily reflect where applicants live.
However, they account for a substantial share of the backlog, with 246,100 cases at the Vermont Service Center, 42,805 in Nebraska, 21,108 in California and 13,250 in Texas.
Humanitarian Cases Make Up Nearly 40 Percent
Humanitarian applications accounted for the largest share of pending cases, with 618,097 awaiting a decision as of June 30, 2026, about 40 percent of the total.
Family-based applications made up a similar share, with 611,067 cases, or roughly 39 percent.
Employment-based applications accounted for 268,408 cases (17 percent), while another 62,718 fell into the other category.
Combined, family and humanitarian applications made up almost four in five of all pending I-485 applications.
The figures offer a snapshot of the backlog on June 30. They do not show how long applicants have been waiting or explain why individual cases remain unresolved.
Trump Tightens Immigration System
About 1.36 million people obtained lawful permanent resident status in fiscal 2024, up from 1.17 million in 2023, according to the Office of Homeland Security Statistics. It was the highest annual total recorded between 2015 and 2024.
President Donald Trump issued a series of immigration orders after returning to the White House in January. These include measures aimed at restricting humanitarian parole and suspending the U.S. refugee admissions program.
Across USCIS as a whole, more than 12.8 million cases were pending as of June 30, 2026, according to the Niskanen Center. The group said this came despite a 34 percent drop in incoming applications compared with the same quarter a year earlier.
USCIS data for April through June showed the approval rate among decided green card applications falling 2.6 percentage points from the previous quarter.
In May, USCIS issued new guidance emphasizing that approval of an application to adjust status is discretionary. The agency said some immigrants in the U.S. on temporary status seeking a green card would generally need to apply through consular processing outside the country, except in extraordinary circumstances. The guidance directed officers to assess applications on a case-by-case basis.
The changes to legal immigration come alongside a wider crackdown focused on ICE arrests and deportations, while making it harder for some people to obtain legal immigration benefits.
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Matthew Cannon and James Debens
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