The spouse and unmarried children under 21 at the relevant time are derivatives and receive conditional permanent residence with the investor. The Child Status Protection Act can preserve a child's eligibility during petition processing, but visa-bulletin backlogs can still cause a child to age out.
Check each child's age against the petition and the visa bulletin
Derivative beneficiaries of an EB-5 petition are the investor's spouse and unmarried children who are under 21. Because EB-5 processing can span years, the Child Status Protection Act allows a child's age to be calculated by subtracting the time the petition was pending from the child's age when a visa becomes available, provided the child seeks to acquire residence within the required period. That protection is valuable but not unlimited.
If the investor's country of chargeability is backlogged in the Visa Bulletin, the wait for visa availability is not subtracted, and a child who was 18 at filing can still turn 21 before a visa number exists. A Lac-Beauport household with a teenager should therefore read the current bulletin for the investor's chargeability, estimate the total wait, and consider whether the child should be the investor instead. All derivatives receive the same two-year conditional status and are included in the petition to remove conditions.
A child who marries before obtaining residence loses derivative eligibility.