GC holder getting Married to F1 visa holder..Advice Needed!

L

lil

Registered Users (C)
I finally received my green card in the mail. I have lived in the US since 2002 on F1 visas and luckily won dv lottery last year. It got approved may 2010 and have been a permanent resident since then.

Here is my dilemma, I will be getting married to my girlfriend of 4.5years next year (we’ve been dating since freshman year), and she is also in the US on F1 visa and currently master’s student graduating May/dec 2011.

We have several options:

1. Get married, Wait till am a citizen before filing I130 , but she will maintain her f1 status in the US by getting a PHD

2. File next year after marriage, and hope that it would take 9-12months for her PD to become current
Here is my worry with option 2 though, Due to uncertainty of visa bulletin, if After filing, and then the dates go back to being 4-5years, then she would not be able to maintain her status in the US as her I20 expires May 2012. Is there any possibility of extending I20 or transferring schools while there is a I130 pending? I would think an I20 extension would not be granted since immigration intent has been shown.

3. Get married, but wait until after she has been accepted into a PHD program with an 120 valid for another 4years before actually filling I130 cause that would save the headache of being in status at all times until the interview.

4. She actually has a job offer based on her first degree from a company in Maryland willing to sponsor H1B but I got a good job in Dallas which ill be starting after graduation. We would like to live together in the same state, therefore this is not a favorable option for us. And we also think that it could make our immigration process more complicated. So she might be turning this offer down and look for a phD program close to my work

5. Get Married and she moves back to home country to wait for the counselor processing. This could take years. I don’t believe that the visa bulletin would remain this short (9-12mths) for years to come. If It goes back to 4-5years. Then we screwed. I really want to be with her and don’t want any separation in this process. Everyone said we should have gotten married before I completed my dv process but we didn’t feel it was the right time to get married. Our families have chosen a convenient date which everyone would be available which is next year.

Sorry for the long post…..I hope you have some suggestions.Any suggestions on the best route to take are welcome
 
Would her graduate study and any associated OPT work last long enough for you to naturalize or really close to it?

If yes, then get married whenever and go the IR route as available as of the time of naturalization.

If you feel lucky, file for F2A category.

Congrats.
 
BigJoe5 said:
Would her graduate study and any associated OPT work last long enough for you to naturalize or really close to it?

If yes, then get married whenever and go the IR route as available as of the time of naturalization.

If you feel lucky, file for F2A category.

Congrats.
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No, I wont Naturalize till 2015. If she takes the job in Maryland, she'll be on H1B but it means we would not be living together when i file. Have there been couples that have been successful without living together in the US?
 
lil said:
2. File next year after marriage, and hope that it would take 9-12months for her PD to become current
Here is my worry with option 2 though, Due to uncertainty of visa bulletin, if After filing, and then the dates go back to being 4-5years, then she would not be able to maintain her status in the US as her I20 expires May 2012. Is there any possibility of extending I20 or transferring schools while there is a I130 pending? I would think an I20 extension would not be granted since immigration intent has been shown.
Click to expand...
File the I-130 ASAP to increase the chances of the PD becoming current before she has to leave. Retrogression is very unlikely before the next fiscal year (October 2011). File now and her PD probably will be current before October.

Extending F1 status while inside the US when an I-130 is pending is usually not a problem, but the I-130 should specify consular processing. If her PD becomes current while she is still in legal status, she can easily switch to AOS simply by filing the I-485. There may be a bit of a delay if they have already sent the files to the consulate, but she'd still be allowed to stay in the US legally once she files the I-485.

lil said:
No, I wont Naturalize till 2015. If she takes the job in Maryland, she'll be on H1B but it means we would not be living together when i file. Have there been couples that have been successful without living together in the US?
Click to expand...
Yes, but they have to show that the separation was due to circumstances such as work or school, and that you have been visiting each other and communicating regularly.
 
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thanks for your response!!! I'll look into filing as soon as possible. I come from a very religious and traditional family, so the traditional rites/ceremony in our home country must be done first before i can file (So she can travel home and back), at this rate it seems like the earliest we can get that done is March, 2011. After that get married immediately in court after getting back to US.

If i file 90 days after entry, that would be around June 2011. Would it be ok to file immediately in March or wait 90 days after?
 
Update: I have decided to go see some lawyers around just to get proper legal advice before proceeding.

Yesterday we went to see a lawyer, when we got to his office he said that i cannot file for her until I become a US citizen and me being a new LPR is not advisable and we should only make long term plans. I know definitely this advice is wrong.

He said he doesn't advice his client to file if the beneficiary is a student and the sponsor is a new LPR. We were shocked about what he said. We even brought up the fact that processing time is now approx. 12months and we should take advantage of that. He said thats not reliable and doesn't advice his client to depend on those dates:confused:

The only thing he was like, i can go ahead and file if my fiancee decides to move back after graduation to our country and complete the processing from there.

We are going to make another appointment with another lawyer.......
 
The lawyers aren't wrong. The relatively short waiting time for the family 2A category is a very recent trend, which goes against the historical trend of 4-5 years, so it cannot be relied on to stay under 12 months for long. It might, it might not.

Second, if you plan to have her leave the US to get married (whether ceremonially or officially), then return and file the GC paperwork, that is a bad idea while you are still an LPR. That's because it would run the risk of having her GC denied for preconceived immigrant intent at her most recent entry to the US (spouses of US citizens get leniency on this issue, spouses of LPRs dont).

But if she stays in the US and gets married and files the paperwork, that mean her last entry would have been very long ago (over a year?) so they won't give a problem of preconceived immigrant intent. Or if she does consular processing, the immigrant intent is a nonfactor (this doesn't require "moving back after graduation", it just requires her to be in the home country for a couple of weeks to complete the consular procedures).
 
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