Citizenship questions

N

nonu

Registered Users (C)
I am close to five years of my Green Card; starting to think about Citizenship. Will appreciate answers to few questions...
- Is the priority date the one called "Residence Since" on my GC?
- Can I send my N400 application 90 days from the "Residence Since" date on GC?
- What if I have to make a trip outside US from when I file the N400 to when I get citizenship?
- How much time is it typically taking for the whole process in California (San Jose).
- Any other advise, will greatly appreciate.

THANKS
 
  1. No, that is the date that you became a permanent resident (important when you fill in the N-400). Your priority date is the date that the USCIS enters your application into their system. You will get a notice about 2 to 4 weeks after you mail your application and your priority date will be on that.
  2. Read the Guide to Naturalization for accurate details. However, in most cases, you become eligible for naturalization 5 years after you get your GC (the date in point 1). You can apply up to ninety days earlier than that. The general recommendation on this list is to figure out the 90 days, and then wait an extra week (for good luck). No one is exactly sure of the USCIS's math here, and if you get it wrong, bad things can happen (like they will return your application, or process your application all the way through and say "oops").
  3. No problem. You need to keep track of those trips and bring them up at your interview. You also need to respect the "continuous residence" and "physical presence" rules all through the application process (again, check out the Guide)
  4. Two months to two or three years depending on your luck. Your best bet to get an idea is to check out the San Jose "timeline" thread on this forum and see what other recent applicants' timelines look like
  5. Advice: be patient, check everything on the form very carefully, be patient, be truthful, and, of course, be patient
 
Flydog said:
No one is exactly sure of the USCIS's math here, and if you get it wrong, bad things can happen (like they will return your application, or process your application all the way through and say "oops").
Click to expand...

As our applications did not get stuck for "early submission", we must have done the calculations right. So, I really don't have any doubt about USCIS' deviation from that simple math.

My spouse's "residence since" date was 8/20/01. Hence, we just added 5 years and arrived at the date 8/20/06. Then subtracted 90 calendar days to arrive at the date 5/22/06. That is the date the application was signed and mailed. Since the approval occurred without questioning the application filing date, I am convinced most of the confusion about USCIS' special calculation is more myth than one would like to believe.
 
Probably. That and people doing stupid things.

My point is that it is much better to wait a handful of days than to go through a 9 month process and find yourself rejected because your application was signed a day early (as has been reported on this forum, more or less).
 
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