Permanent Residency and Adoption

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Verma03-027

Registered Users (C)
I'm a recent permanent resident and a month before approval I adopted a 7-yr old child. I found out that I can't bring her here easily. If I understand correctly, I can't bring her here and apply for her permanent residencey as the child has not lived with us for two years. :eek: Now the question is how do I satisfy this two year condition? One way I can bring the child here is to wait for five yrs, get citizenship and then bring the child here. But this is not a solution that I'mlooking for.

Another way I thought is to get the child on tourist Visa for six months, apply for extension for another six months, then the child goes to India for couple of months and then repeat the process again. What are the pitfalls in this approach? Can the child join elementary school on a tourist visa?

Can somebody help me?

Thanks
 
As far as I know the 180 day bar, and the year bar does not apply if the person is less than 18, but I do not know if it makes the kid inelegible for adjustment.
 
Verma03-027 said:
I'm a recent permanent resident and a month before approval I adopted a 7-yr old child. I found out that I can't bring her here easily. If I understand correctly, I can't bring her here and apply for her permanent residencey as the child has not lived with us for two years. :eek: Now the question is how do I satisfy this two year condition? One way I can bring the child here is to wait for five yrs, get citizenship and then bring the child here. But this is not a solution that I'mlooking for.

Another way I thought is to get the child on tourist Visa for six months, apply for extension for another six months, then the child goes to India for couple of months and then repeat the process again. What are the pitfalls in this approach? Can the child join elementary school on a tourist visa?

Can somebody help me?

Thanks
Click to expand...

This my limited knowledge about adoption:
As far I know as you are adopted your child before your I-485 approval, he/she is eligible follow-to-join consular processing. It takes about 6-12 months depending on the country where you adopted. This is the easiest way I can think of. For FTJ consular processing you need to have some proof that you adopted him/her before your approval.

I am not sure if there is any other way to get your child faster way. I know a biological child can enter USA provided the child is entering for first time with parent (there are some other conditions too, I don't remember exactly). I don't know whether same rule applies to adopted child.

If you adopted the child after your I-485 approval, it would have gone to famility based consular processing - which has a long waiting.

Tourst visa will be difficult to get for your child because he/she is a potential immigrant.
 
interested in knowing more about this

I think you have to stay two years with the kid for bringing the child over here.
 
Based on the research my wife and I did, adopting a child from another country (not just one's native country) is impossible unless at least one of the two adoptive parents is a US citizen. As Verma reported, if the adoptive parents are permamnent residents, then an adoptive child needs to have spent two years in the parents' home before s/he can be eligible for a green card. However, the adoptive parents cannot be away from the US for more than 6 months/year without losing their own green cards. It's a catch-22. I read someplace that some Indians have petitioned USCIS to allow such adoptions, but ....
 
budboy said:
However, the adoptive parents cannot be away from the US for more than 6 months/year without losing their own green cards. .
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This not exactly true. Staying outside USA more than 180 days (6 months) break continuous residency (which is useful for nautturalization), but it does not affect green card. Staying outside USA one year or more can result in lose of permanent resident status, unless the person has a re-entry permit. Re-entry permit is a good option is someone wants to live outside USA more than one year. Re-entry permit is good for two years.

There some info about adoption in usvisa.com site:
http://www.usvisa.com/adoptions.htm
 
Thanks for the responses. As mentioned by some of you, I also understand the catch 22 situation. What I'm looking for is that is there a round about way to overcome the problem of bringing the child here and stay with us in some other status. If the child is here, I can wait for filing for the GC until I get citizenship.

As I said:

Verma03-027 said:
Another way I thought is to get the child on tourist Visa for six months, apply for extension for another six months, then the child goes to India for couple of months and then repeat the process again. What are the pitfalls in this approach? Can the child join elementary school on a tourist visa?
Click to expand...

I don't know whether we would be able to get B1 Visa or not as it is easy for anyone to figure out that the child is potential immigrant. But if the child is granted Visa, can there be any other problems.

By the way, some people suggested me that get the child here on any temporary visa and let her overstay out of status until we get citizenship. Is that an option?
 
Verma03-027 said:
By the way, some people suggested me that get the child here on any temporary visa and let her overstay out of status until we get citizenship. Is that an option?
Click to expand...

You might want to consult with a good attorney. The problem is I guess it will be very difficult for your child to get any non-immigrant visa.

You might want to drop the same question in Life after The Green Card forum where there are some more experts in immigration issues.
 
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