Advance Parole
Advance Parole is a document that allows certain aliens to re-enter the United States without an immigrant visa or non-immigrant visa after traveling abroad. Such aliens must be granted Advance Parole before leaving the United States. If they have not obtained Advance Parole prior to traveling abroad, they may not be permitted to re-enter the United States upon their return without obtaining some kind of visa.

There are two main functions of an Advance Parole: 1) It enables an alien to come back to the U.S. after traveling abroad without having to obtain a visa to enter the U.S., 2) It preserves the pending Adjustment of Status or certain protected status that the alien has filed. Indeed, if an alien files for Adjustment of Status and then enters the U.S, on a visa instead of an Advanced Parole, the pending I-485 or a protected status may be considered as abandoned. For instance, an applicant for Adjustment of Status who leaves the U.S. and re-enters on a non-immigrant visa such as F-1 will generally be considered to have abandoned his/her adjustment application. The single exception to this rule applies to H-1 and L-1 holders, and will be discussed in a chapter below.