How to Apply for Cancellation of Removal (LPR & Non-LPR)

To apply for cancellation of removal, you file Form EOIR-42A if you are a lawful permanent resident or Form EOIR-42B if you are not, submit it to the immigration court handling your removal case, and present your evidence at a merits hearing before an immigration judge. This relief only exists as a defense inside immigration court. You cannot apply at a USCIS office on your own initiative; the government must first place you in removal proceedings by serving a Notice to Appear, and only then can you ask the judge to cancel your removal.

Two separate tracks exist, with different requirements, forms, and fees. Which one applies to you depends entirely on whether you already hold a green card.

Who Qualifies

If You Already Have a Green Card

Permanent residents facing deportation must meet three requirements. You must have held lawful permanent resident status for at least five years when you apply. You must have lived in the United States continuously for at least seven years after being lawfully admitted in any immigration status; time you spent here on a valid visa before getting your green card counts toward that seven-year clock. And you must not have been convicted of an aggravated felony.¹

Meeting all three is not the same as winning. Cancellation is discretionary. The judge weighs positive factors like family ties, length of residence, employment history, and community involvement against negative ones like criminal history and immigration violations. An applicant who checks every eligibility box can still lose if the judge decides the negatives outweigh the positives.

If You Do Not Have a Green Card

The bar is higher for non-permanent residents. You must show all four of the following:

Ten years of continuous physical presence in the United States immediately before you file.
Good moral character throughout that ten-year period.
No disqualifying criminal convictions.
Exceptional and extremely unusual hardship to a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident spouse, parent, or child if you are deported.

Each requirement is strictly enforced.¹ A grant of cancellation on this track adjusts your status to lawful permanent resident.

What Can Take You Out of the Running

The Stop-Time Rule

The clock for your seven or ten years of residence stops on whichever comes first: the date you are served a valid Notice to Appear, or the date you commit certain criminal offenses that make you deportable or inadmissible.¹

The word “valid” carries weight. The Supreme Court ruled in Pereira v. Sessions (2018) and Niz-Chavez v. Garland (2021) that a Notice to Appear must contain all legally required information, including the time and place of the hearing, in a single document to trigger the stop-time rule. If the government served you a deficient notice, the clock may not have stopped. An experienced immigration attorney should look at the notice in your case.

Travel Abroad

For non-permanent residents, a single trip outside the country lasting more than 90 days, or multiple trips adding up to more than 180 days total, destroys continuous physical presence. The rule is absolute. A family emergency that kept you abroad too long can wipe out years of accumulated time.¹

Criminal Convictions

Any aggravated felony conviction permanently bars a permanent resident from cancellation. The term is broader than it sounds. It covers theft with a sentence of one year or more even if fully suspended, fraud involving more than $10,000, drug trafficking, crimes of violence with a sentence of one year or more, and sexual offenses. Attempting or conspiring to commit any of these counts too.² What matters is the sentence the court ordered, not the time you served.

Good Moral Character Bars

Non-permanent residents face a separate list of acts that automatically prevent a good moral character finding during the ten-year period: habitual drunkenness, crimes involving moral turpitude, controlled substance offenses, multiple convictions with combined sentences of five years or more, drug trafficking, income primarily from illegal gambling, two or more gambling convictions, false testimony given to obtain any immigration benefit, incarceration totaling 180 days or more, smuggling others into the country, and practicing polygamy.³ False testimony is especially dangerous, because even a small lie on an earlier immigration application can sink your case years later.⁴

The Hardship Standard for Non-LPRs

Most non-LPR cancellation cases are won or lost here. The standard is deliberately high. Ordinary disruption, like uprooting your children from their school or losing a household income, does not meet it. You must show that a qualifying relative would suffer harm substantially beyond what families normally face when a member is deported.

The hardship must fall on a qualifying relative, not on you. Qualifying relatives are limited to a spouse, parent, or child who is a U.S. citizen or a lawful permanent resident. Stepchildren qualify if you married their parent before the stepchild turned 18. Hardship to siblings, grandparents, or undocumented family members does not count.

Strong hardship evidence tends to involve a qualifying relative’s medical condition requiring specialized treatment unavailable in your home country, a mental health diagnosis tied to your potential removal, a child’s special educational needs, or a relative’s complete financial dependence on you with no realistic ability to become self-sufficient. Professional evaluations from doctors or psychologists carry significant weight and typically cost between $800 and $3,000. Vague assertions that your family would be sad do not move the needle.

Forms, Fees, and Evidence

Download the current version of Form EOIR-42A or EOIR-42B from the Executive Office for Immigration Review website. Both forms require extensive personal information, including every address and every job for the past ten years, and details about your family members.⁵

As of 2026, the filing fee for EOIR-42A is $710 and the filing fee for EOIR-42B is $1,640. Both require an additional $30 per-person biometrics fee.⁶ Since February 23, 2026, EOIR no longer accepts checks or money orders for immigration fees. Filing fees must be submitted electronically through the EOIR Payment Portal. The biometrics fee is paid separately to USCIS, which will then send you an appointment notice for fingerprints and a photograph at an Application Support Center. Keep the confirmation from that appointment.

Proving Continuous Presence

Build a paper trail that places you in the United States on specific dates. Tax returns and W-2s are the strongest evidence. Supplement them with pay stubs, leases, utility bills, bank statements, and medical records. For children, school enrollment and immunization records work well. Any official document with your name and a date helps fill gaps in the timeline.

Proving Character and Hardship

Support letters from employers, community members, religious leaders, and family should describe your character and specific contributions rather than offer generic praise. Evidence of community service, completed courses, and clean criminal history all help.

For hardship on the EOIR-42B, gather medical records, psychological evaluations, school records showing special needs, country-condition reports about your home country, and financial documents showing your qualifying relative’s dependence on you. Every document not in English must be accompanied by a certified translation, which typically runs $20 to $60 per page.

Assembling and Filing the Package

File the original application with the immigration court handling your case. The package should include the completed form, all supporting evidence, your fee receipt, and a certificate of service proving you gave a copy of everything to the ICE attorney. The immigration judge sets a filing deadline, and missing it can get your application thrown out. Do not wait until the last day to assemble everything.

The Merits Hearing

The individual merits hearing is your day in court. You testify under oath, present your evidence, and your attorney makes legal arguments about why you qualify. The government’s attorney cross-examines you and any witnesses, challenges your evidence, and argues against relief. Preparation is decisive. Inconsistencies between your testimony and your application, or between your testimony and the documents, give the government ammunition to argue you lack credibility.

Even after confirming you meet the eligibility requirements, the judge exercises discretion by weighing favorable and unfavorable factors. Favorable factors include long residence, strong family ties, steady employment, community involvement, and rehabilitation if you have any criminal history. Unfavorable factors include the nature of any crimes, immigration violations, and evidence of bad character. The judge may issue a decision orally at the end of the hearing or in writing later.

The 4,000-Case Annual Cap

Federal law limits grants of cancellation to non-permanent residents to 4,000 per fiscal year. The cap does not apply to permanent residents. Demand far exceeds 4,000 grants annually, so cases often sit for years waiting for a number to become available even after a judge approves the application. If the cap has been reached for the fiscal year, your approved case effectively goes into a queue until the next year.¹

If You Are Denied

A denial is not necessarily the end. You can appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals by filing Form EOIR-26. The filing fee is $1,030, and a fee waiver is available through Form EOIR-26A if you cannot afford it.⁷

The deadline has recently tightened. Historically, you had 30 calendar days to file the appeal after the judge issued a decision. As of March 2026, the government reduced this to 10 calendar days for most immigration cases. Because this change has been subject to legal challenges, confirm the current deadline with your attorney or the EOIR website immediately after receiving a decision. Missing the deadline by even one day makes the judge’s order final.

If your case is ultimately denied and no further appeals succeed, the judge will issue a removal order. That order generally bars you from returning to the United States for ten years and from applying for cancellation, adjustment of status, and several other immigration benefits for ten years.⁸ More than one removal extends the bar to twenty years, and a removal combined with an aggravated felony conviction creates a permanent bar.

If Cancellation Is Granted

If the judge grants cancellation, the removal case is over, but you still need proof of your new status. For non-permanent residents, the grant adjusts your status to lawful permanent resident. To get your green card, call the USCIS Contact Center at 800-375-5283 to request an appointment at your local USCIS office. Wait at least three business days after the court order before calling, so the office has time to receive information about your case.⁹

Bring a copy of the judge’s order, your appointment confirmation, and a valid passport. USCIS can stamp your passport as proof of status while your green card is being processed. If you do not have a passport, bring two passport-style photographs so USCIS can create an alternative proof-of-status document.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1229b – Cancellation of Removal; Adjustment of Status
2
USCIS Policy Manual. Permanent Bars to Good Moral Character
3
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Conditional Bars to Establishing Good Moral Character
4
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Conditional Bars for Acts in Statutory Period
5
U.S. Department of Justice. Application for Cancellation of Removal and Adjustment of Status for Certain Nonpermanent Residents
6
Executive Office for Immigration Review. EOIR Forms and Fees
7
Executive Office for Immigration Review. Appeal an Immigration Judges Decision
8
U.S. Department of State. Ineligibility Based on Previous Removal and Unlawful Presence in the United States – INA 212(a)(9)
9
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Naturalization for Those Granted Cancellation of Removal or Suspension of Deportation