Is it possible ???

Dear friends,

i am looking for your kind advice regarding my wife who wish to apply for US citizenship on the basis that her father has just become a US citizen.

her father got citzenship recently and perhaps he had also applied along with him the citizenship for the rest of his unmarried childern including my wife who are all in pakistan...my wife was unmarried at the time when her father applied but before they could hear anything back from the embassy she got married with me (a british citizen) in april. Now as she is no more an unmarried child so may be she would not be able to get the citizenship. this is just my thinking as i am not sure what exactly the rules are regarding this situation. if what i am thinking is correct then would the father of my wife be able to apply for my wife again as a married child ???

I am sorry if i have left any confusion in the information provided above as i am very new to US immigration processes.

would appreciate gratefuly for any assistance in this matter.

Are you really talking citizenship, or about immigrating to the US? They are two different things.

Your wife would not have become a US citizen through her father's naturalization if she was not living in the US at the time. Her father can, however, petition for both of you to immigrate to the US (third preference). They are currently processing petitions which were filed in June 2002 (see here), except for people born in Mexico or the Philippines.

Marco 72 wrote:Are you really talking citizenship, or about immigrating to the US? They are two different things.

Your wife would not have become a US citizen through her father's naturalization if she was not living in the US at the time. Her father can, however, petition for both of you to immigrate to the US (third preference). They are currently processing petitions which were filed in June 2002 (see here), except for people born in Mexico or the Philippines.

Thanks Marco for your kind reply and the info. it has really been very helpful...

from the information provided in your post it looks like i was supposed to say immigrating to US not citizenship. I am sorry for my mistake. she was surely in pakistan while her father was in the US and after he got his green card/citizenship he straightaway applied for his unmarried childern as his married childern were all well settled in different countries and did not wish to immigrate to US except for my wife who now wish to go to US as she has her parents there.

Now her father is retired and does not work anymore so under current circumstances would he be able to make a petition for my wife and me and how would it affect the petition if (May God forbid that this happens) that her father is no more. just asking as it takes ages to complete ??

also i have visited the link that you have provided in your post and it looks like they are taking hell of time to process the petitions completely as also mentioned in your post that they are processing June 2002 petitions now which means aftre eight years ??

thirdly i would very much appreciate that if you can please provide any link/previous post where i can find the stages of immigration and the kind of documents required for the petition to be made ??


God bless !!

Bringing Children, Sons and Daughters to Live in the United States as Permanent Residents


regards

hoeny123 wrote:she was surely in pakistan while her father was in the US and after he got his green card/citizenship he straightaway applied for his unmarried childern as his married childern were all well settled in different countries and did not wish to immigrate to US except for my wife who now wish to go to US as she has her parents there.

When you say "he got his green card/citizenship": are you not sure which one? Because it makes a very big difference, in your case.

hoeny123 wrote:Now her father is retired and does not work anymore so under current circumstances would he be able to make a petition for my wife and me and how would it affect the petition if (May God forbid that this happens) that her father is no more. just asking as it takes ages to complete ??

What is your mother-in-law's status in the US? Is she a citizen or a permanent resident (green card holder)?

hoeny123 wrote:also i have visited the link that you have provided in your post and it looks like they are taking hell of time to process the petitions completely as also mentioned in your post that they are processing June 2002 petitions now which means aftre eight years ??

This is due to the fact that there are only a limited number of places available in each category per year. However, the past is no indication of the future.

Thanks Marco once again for your kind attention to this matter....also thanks to Sushdmehta for providing that link containing useful informaiton about the eligibility plus docs required for petition.

To Marco:

1) just came to know that her father is a citizen not green card holder...sorry i mixed them up in the previous post


2) Since her father made petitions for the whole of family members including spouse so her mother jsut heard from the embassy a month ago and probably she has/is going to submit her passport for the visa, not sure though what it is going to be, a greencard or just a visa?


Regards !

You cannot get a green card outside the US. What you get is an "immigrant visa", which is valid for 6 months. When you travel to the US with this visa and are admitted, you become a green card holder from that moment.

Your wife's mother will be processed very quickly, since she is an immediate relative and not subject to quotas. In three years' time she will be able to naturalize as a US citizen, and she should file another petition for your wife (you are allowed to have multiple petitions in the system).

Marco 72 wrote:You cannot get a green card outside the US. What you get is an "immigrant visa", which is valid for 6 months. When you travel to the US with this visa and are admitted, you become a green card holder from that moment.

Your wife's mother will be processed very quickly, since she is an immediate relative and not subject to quotas. In three years' time she will be able to naturalize as a US citizen, and she should file another petition for your wife (you are allowed to have multiple petitions in the system).

what if the parents die while the petition is still in the process ? would the petition be revoked automatically or continued regardless of whether the petitioner is alive or not ?

Thanks!

If the petioner dies any time before you "activate" your green card, then the petition becomes void. Even if you do get your visas but the petitioner dies before you use them to enter the US and become permanent residents, then the visas are no longer valid. That's another reason to have more than one petition in the system. By the way, did your father-in-law petition for his daugher before her marriage?

Marco 72 wrote:If the petioner dies any time before you "activate" your green card, then the petition becomes void. Even if you do get your visas but the petitioner dies before you use them to enter the US and become permanent residents, then the visas are no longer valid. That's another reason to have more than one petition in the system. By the way, did your father-in-law petition for his daugher before her marriage?

yes they did it before her marriage and i have been told by my wife that her father filed petitions a long time ago and only her mother has been able to get a call from the embassy but her sister is still waiting. me n my wife got married in april this year and her mother got a call a month ago so you can have an idea of the situation that how close my wife was to get a call to submit her passport but got married before that.

i think her father hasn't done anything to it yet i mean he hasn't withdrawn the application yet and this is what exactly i wanted to ask you next that in the situation where my wife's petition on unmarried basis is still in process or infact close to the completion, can we do anything that we can somehow continue with the current application by getting it updated with my information and the marital status of my wife to help avoid 8 years wait again???

When she married you, your wife went from first to third family preference. If you look at the Visa Bulletin, the first preference has a "retrospective waiting time" of about 2 years and 8 months. Again, this is not an indication of the future - it just tells you how long people in this category who are getting the visa now had to wait for it. Those in the third preference category had to wait 8 years and 5 months.

Your father-in-law should update the petition, since his daugher is now married. See here for instructions.

Marco 72 wrote:When she married you, your wife went from first to third family preference. If you look at the Visa Bulletin, the first preference has a "retrospective waiting time" of about 2 years and 8 months. Again, this is not an indication of the future - it just tells you how long people in this category who are getting the visa now had to wait for it. Those in the third preference category had to wait 8 years and 5 months.

Your father-in-law should update the petition, since his daugher is now married. See here for instructions.

So does this means that telling the embassy about the change in circumstances would only change the preference but not the time...meaning that after informing them the application is going to take the same first prefernce processing time period (obviously in our case it would now only be a few months remaining as her mother has alread got the call and she was supposed to be the next) but will be transfered in the third preference ??

Also, I need to tell you one more thing before i could please ask for your kind suggestion in the light of the whole scenario. As you know that me and my wife got married in april this year so she has changed her surname on her pakistani ID to my name and have applied for her UK settlement visa which is in the process at the moment. while the visa in process she stays in paksitan.

Now when her US petition is close to a decision and on the other hand her UK application is in process, how her father should inform US embassy about this change of circumstances to ensure that her both applications go smoothly ?

Do we also have to inform US embassy that she has applied for Uk settlement visa as well and that she might be travelling to uk soon subject to grant of a visa by the UK embassy and that if she is able to get a uk spouse visa then she would be a permanent resident of the UK in two years time and that one year following to that according to the UK immigration rules her nationality might change from pakistani to british and now if the application in the US embassy takes more than 3 years time then she might be a british by that time. I am asking you this because just in case if the US embassy takes more than three years time to decide her petition and ask her to send her passport then they will not be surprised to see that she is no more a pakistani national ?

Thanks & Regards,