Can an Employer Revoke an Approved I-140 Petition?

Yes, an employer can revoke an approved I-140 petition, and they can do it at any time by sending a written withdrawal request to USCIS. What matters for you is timing. Once the petition has been approved for 180 days, or once your Form I-485 has been pending for 180 days, the approval stays on the books even after withdrawal. Your priority date survives, H-1B extensions past the six-year cap remain available, and you can still port your green card to a new employer. Before that 180-day mark, a withdrawal is far more damaging and can undo your green card process.¹

Most workers first learn about a withdrawal from the USCIS online case status or a notice in the mail. The employer has no legal duty to warn you in advance.

The 180-Day Rule Is the Whole Ballgame

Federal regulations say that a petition approved for 180 days or more stays approved even if the employer withdraws it or the sponsoring company goes out of business. After that point, USCIS can only revoke on separate grounds like fraud or material error.²

There is a second trigger many workers miss. If you have filed an I-485 adjustment of status application and that I-485 has been pending 180 days or more, the I-140 also remains approved regardless of a withdrawal.² Either clock protects you: 180 days from I-140 approval, or 180 days from I-485 filing.

Once you cross that line, a withdrawal changes very little in practical terms. Your approved petition stays on record. Your priority date is yours. You can use the approval to extend H-1B status or to move your green card application to a different employer. The employer walks away; your file does not.

What a Withdrawal Before 180 Days Costs You

Before the 180-day mark, a withdrawal treats the petition as no longer valid. Any pending I-485 tied to that petition is typically denied.³

You also lose the ability to port under AC21, because portability requires both an approved (or approvable) I-140 and an I-485 that has been pending at least 180 days. Without both, a new employer would need to file a fresh I-140 and start the green card process from scratch. If you are in this position, the urgent task is holding on to valid nonimmigrant status, usually H-1B, while a new sponsor comes together. This is a moment to talk to an immigration attorney, not to wait and see.

Your Priority Date After Withdrawal

For workers from backlogged countries, the priority date can represent ten years or more of waiting. It is the single most valuable thing in the file, and a routine employer withdrawal does not take it away.

If your I-140 was approved at any point, you can carry that priority date forward to a new I-140 filed by a different employer in the EB-1, EB-2, or EB-3 category. If you have more than one approved petition over the years, you keep the earliest priority date.⁴

There are only four situations that strip the priority date permanently:

Fraud or willful misrepresentation in the original petition.
Revocation of the underlying permanent labor certification by the Department of Labor.
A finding by USCIS or the Department of State that the labor certification was invalid.
A determination by USCIS that approving the original petition rested on a material factual or legal error.

A routine withdrawal by the employer is not on that list.⁴

H-1B Extensions Past the Six-Year Cap

An approved I-140 unlocks H-1B extensions beyond the normal six-year limit, and that benefit survives a withdrawal that happens after 180 days of approval. Two extension lengths are possible:

Three-year extensions when you have an approved I-140 in EB-1, EB-2, or EB-3 and no immigrant visa number is currently available to you under the Visa Bulletin. This is the common case for backlogged workers.
One-year extensions when a visa number is available but the green card has not yet issued, or when at least 365 days have passed since a labor certification or I-140 was filed on your behalf.

If your former employer withdraws the I-140 after 180 days, the approval stands and a new H-1B employer can sponsor these extensions.⁵ For many workers this is what makes staying in the country possible during a decade-long wait.

Changing Employers Under AC21

If your I-485 has been pending 180 days or more, you can port your green card to a new employer without restarting. This protection applies even when your original employer withdraws the I-140.³ To qualify, all of the following must be true:

The underlying I-140 was approved, or is pending and approvable.
The petition is in EB-1, EB-2, or EB-3.
Your I-485 has been pending with USCIS for at least 180 calendar days when you request to port.
The new position is in the same or a similar occupational classification as the job on the original petition.
You submit Form I-485 Supplement J to confirm the new job offer.

The new position can be with a different employer or self-employment.³ The “same or similar” test is where portability requests most often run into trouble. USCIS does not just compare job titles or SOC codes; officers look at duties, required education and skills, wages, and the totality of the circumstances.⁶ A software engineer moving to senior software engineer is straightforward. A software engineer moving to product manager may not be.

If you port and USCIS later finds the new job wasn’t similar enough, a new employer would need to file a fresh I-140 to support a new adjustment application, even if the withdrawal happened after 180 days.³ The priority date would survive; the I-485 would restart.

Revocations That Aren’t a Withdrawal

Some revocations happen automatically, without the employer choosing to pull the petition. The 180-day rule generally applies to these the same way it applies to a voluntary withdrawal.

The sponsoring company terminates or ceases operations. If the business closes 180 days or more after the I-140 approval or after the I-485 filing, the petition stays approved.²
The Department of Labor revokes the underlying labor certification, which pulls the foundation out from under the I-140.
The beneficiary or petitioner dies, though certain survivor protections may preserve benefits for qualifying family members.

If another company acquires your employer through a merger or similar transaction, the acquiring company can step in as a successor-in-interest and take over the existing I-140, preserving the priority date and the green card process. Successor claims turn on whether the same job at the same wage is genuinely being offered, whether both the old and new companies can document ability to pay, and whether the acquisition itself is properly evidenced.⁷

Your Right to Notice if You’ve Ported

USCIS sends the Notice of Intent to Revoke to the employer. Historically, the beneficiary had no formal role. That changed with USCIS’s adoption of the Matter of V-S-G- decision in 2017. Workers who have properly requested to port under AC21 are treated as affected parties in any revocation proceeding involving their I-140.⁸ As an affected party, you receive the NOIR directly, you can respond before a decision is made, and you can appeal or move to reopen if the petition is revoked.

You typically have 30 days to respond to a NOIR. If it is mailed, USCIS adds 3 days for delivery, for 33 total. Workers residing outside the United States get 14 extra days.⁹

The protection is narrow. If you have not requested portability, meaning you are still with the original employer or have not filed Supplement J, you are not an affected party and have no independent standing in the revocation.⁸ Many immigration attorneys recommend filing a portability request as soon as you are eligible, even without an active job change, precisely to lock in that standing.

When the 180-Day Rule Does Not Save You

The 180-day protection covers routine withdrawals and business closures. It does not cover fraud or material error. Those are the revocations that erase immigration history.

Fraud or Willful Misrepresentation

If USCIS finds the I-140 was obtained through false information, the petition is revoked retroactively, as though it was never approved. Common examples include employers filing a prevailing wage determination for a worksite where they never intended to place the worker, submitting falsified financial documents to hide inability to pay, or workers submitting fake educational credentials or fabricated experience letters.¹⁰

A fraud-based revocation strips the priority date, nullifies the 180-day protection, and can trigger inadmissibility under federal immigration law. The inadmissibility bar for fraud or willful misrepresentation is indefinite. Waivers exist for certain family members of U.S. citizens and permanent residents, but they require proving extreme hardship to a qualifying relative. Workers without those family ties have very limited options.

Material Error

A material error revocation means USCIS made a meaningful mistake in approving the petition. No one lied; the adjudicator got it wrong. Examples include relying on financial records tied to the wrong employer identification number, approving despite the employer never demonstrating ability to pay under the applicable standards, or overlooking that the worker lacked the required education or experience.¹⁰

Like fraud, material error strips the priority date and takes the petition outside the 180-day protection.⁴ Unlike fraud, it does not carry an inadmissibility finding, so you are not barred from entering the country. But losing the priority date can mean losing years of waiting. If you receive a NOIR alleging material error and believe the original approval was correct, a detailed response inside the 30-day window is what preserves the petition.

1
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Petition Filing and Processing Procedures for Form I-140, Immigrant Petition for Alien Workers
2
eCFR. 8 CFR 205.1 – Automatic Revocation
3
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Job Portability after Adjustment Filing and Other AC21 Provisions
4
eCFR. 8 CFR 204.5 – Petitions for Employment-Based Immigrants
5
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. FAQs for Individuals in H-1B Nonimmigrant Status
6
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. How USCIS Determines Same or Similar Occupational Classifications for Job Portability Under AC21
7
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Successor-in-Interest Determinations in Adjudication of Form I-140 Petitions
8
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Matter of V-S-G- Inc., Adopted Decision 2017-06
9
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Chapter 10 – Post-Decision Actions
10
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Guidance on Notice to, and Standing for, AC21 Beneficiaries about I-140 Approvals Being Revoked After Matter of V-S-G- Inc.