long winded Citizenship application - is it possible

[wadeinusa]

Hi all,
I will try to cut a long story short.
Firstly I am a green card holder with no conditions.
I lived in Chicago from 2001-2007, payed taxes, did everything right, was a proper law abiding person with no problems.
In 2007 I needed to return to Australia for some quite pressing family issues, this was only expected to take around 6 months to resolve but has taken a lot longer. Things went from bad to worse and it has taken around 2 years to resolve. I planned on heading back to the US earlier this year and had an SB1 visa approved (now expired).
I was wondering, since I did meet all the requirements to become a citizen (ie perm resident from 2001-2007, paid taxes etc etc) can I still apply on those grounds now???
I have been so lucky to have a wonderful employer to give me my job back and has been very helpful....I just need to get back there...to my life.
All help will be appreciated.

 

[baikal3]

No, your situation is very clear, with absolutely no wiggle room. Because of your 2 year+ absence (by the way, you are still abroad, right?), you are currently ineligible to apply for naturalization. In order to be eligible, all the required conditions (continuous residency, physical presence, etc) must be satisfied at the moment of application. It is absolutely irrelevant that you might have satisfied the eligibility criteria for filing N-400 at some point in the past. In fact, as I understand it, you are not even an LPR at the moment since your old green card status is no longer valid and your SB-1 visa has expired before you used it for re-entry.
In order to become eligible for N-400, you would have to get a new SB-1 visa and re-enter the U.S. using it, and then wait five years (OK, 5 years minus 90 days) before submitting N-400.

 

[Bobsmyth]

I was wondering, since I did meet all the requirements to become a citizen (ie perm resident from 2001-2007, paid taxes etc etc) can I still apply on those grounds now???
I have been so lucky to have a wonderful employer to give me my job back and has been very helpful....I just need to get back there...to my life.
All help will be appreciated.

You've already abandoned your LPR status by remaining out of the US for over 1 year without a reentry permit. You'll have to reapply for permanent residency and reestablish the physical presence and continuous residency requirements before you can apply for naturalization.