US citizenship application - still under green card

pelelo

New Member
Hello,

At this time I have my green card. In about 1 year I will be able to apply for the US citizenship.

Due to working reasons, my job will involve extensive travelling overseas (outside of USA), I might be in this job assignment for about 1 year. The intent is to travel for 2 months overseas, then come back to USA for 3 weeks, then go back overseas again. All this will happen for about 1 to 1.5 years.

My question is, under this situation, do you think this is going to affect or delay my application for the US citizenship?, or the fact that I leave for 2 months and come back will not affect such process?

Please advise. Thanks.
 
It might affect it, depending how long you do that before you apply. Have you calculated what that traveling will do in regards to your physical presence requirement? The requirement is 30 months presence within the US in the 5 years preceding the application, so assuming you have spent most of the time so far in the US you will probably be OK based on what you said above. Obviously the longer you spend doing roughly 8 weeks out to 3 weeks in US before you apply, the more the balance of physical presence will move against you. You also need to reside in the location of application for 3 months before you apply. Be aware that the N400 asks for dates of all travel outside the US.

Also there is the caveat that frequent short trips might be deemed to be breaking continuous residence, but I assume you will be working for a US employer and maintaining your US abode, paying US taxes, etc so you should be able to overcome any concerns on that front.
 
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