Center Routing Drives a 244-Day Gap as I-131 Medians Diverge Sharply
The week of June 22 brought a 35-day jump in the aggregate I-131 median, but the more consequential signal is LIN's 380-day median against IOE's 141 days — a spread that overwhelms the week-to-week noise.
The I-131 (Application for Travel Document) median rose 35 days week over week, from 157 to 192 days for the week of June 22. That move draws attention, but the underlying 8-week slope remains negative at -6.0 days per week, meaning the trend was still improving before this week's reading. The more durable story is a 244-day spread between service centers: cases processed at the Nebraska Service Center (LIN) are clearing at a 380-day median, while those at the IOE electronic-filing channel and the California Service Center (WAC) are clearing near 136 to 141 days. Where a case is routed matters far more than this week's aggregate number.
- The week-of-June-22 I-131 median rose 35 days (from 157 to 192 days) week over week, but the 8-week slope of -6.0 days per week shows the underlying direction remains downward.
- LIN cases carry a 380-day median this week versus 141 days at IOE, a gap of 239 days that triggered the uneven_centers anomaly flag at a spread value of 298.86.
- RFE (Request for Evidence) cases posted an anomalously low 27-day median versus 194 days for non-RFE cases, a ratio of about 7 to 1 that likely reflects a small resolved batch rather than a structural change.
- The total active I-131 pending caseload stood at 133,903 cases as of the July 7 snapshot, up 129% over 61 days, with the April 2026 filing-month group accounting for the largest share of that growth at 25,838 added active cases.
- The 4-week forecast projects a continued gradual decline, but the wide confidence band of roughly ±38 days around each projection means actual readings could vary considerably week to week.
A spike on top of a trend that was improving
The I-131 median for the week of June 22 came in at 192 days, up 35 days from 157 days the prior week. That is a notable single-week move, but the 8-week regression slope of -6.0 days per week tells a different story about direction: the broader arc has been bending downward since the W17 to W19 peak, and this week's reading appears to be a one-week fluctuation on a still-improving trend rather than a reversal.
The 12-week range for this form runs from 136 days (W15) to 240 days (W19), so this week's 192 sits well below the recent high-water mark. The 12-week trailing average of 187 days means 192 is only modestly above the recent norm, not a break from it. The regression's R² of 0.41 is a moderate fit, which is a reason to avoid over-reading any single week's reading in either direction.
Where you are processed matters more than when you filed
A 244-day gap between service centers
The uneven_centers anomaly flag fired this week at a value of 298.86, reflecting the raw spread across active centers. The specific center medians tell the story: LIN (Nebraska Service Center) sits at 380 days across 286 approvals this week; WAC (California Service Center) sits at 136 days across 231 approvals; IOE (the electronic-filing channel) sits at 141 days across 828 approvals. The National Benefits Center (MSC) reads 224 days, but with only 16 approvals this week its number is too thin to interpret reliably. LIN's 8-week slope of -3.7 days per week suggests modest improvement there, but the absolute level at 380 days remains very high — more than 2.7 times IOE's median.
IOE handles the largest share of this week's approved cases: 828 of 1,361, about 61% of the weekly total. That weighting pulls the aggregate median toward IOE's faster pace. Applicants processed at LIN make up about 21% of approvals this week but face a timeline nearly 2.7 times longer. The aggregate median of 192 days is a real number, but it reflects the mix of these very different pipelines rather than any single applicant's likely experience.
The unusual week when RFE cases cleared faster
An RFE (Request for Evidence) is USCIS's standard follow-up letter requesting missing documents. Receiving one does not signal denial; most RFE'd cases are still approved, though they typically take longer to resolve than cases that proceed without one. This week that pattern inverted: the rfe_fast anomaly flag fired, with RFE-stamped cases posting a median of just 27 days versus 194 days for non-RFE cases — a ratio of about 7 to 1. The most plausible reading is that a small batch of recently resolved RFE responses happened to clear together this week; the data brief does not confirm a mechanism, and a single week at this ratio is not a reliable signal of any structural change in how USCIS processes RFE responses for I-131.
7.13x RFE response cases clear faster than the plain processing cohort.
At 27 days, the RFE median this week reflects a one-week batch resolution, not a new baseline for how long RFE responses take to clear.
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