sponsoring a canadian fiance

Hey there people, I am a Canadian Indian and will be moving to the U.S in '09 now under the Jay Treaty, I am allowed to live and work in the U.S and able to sponsor my wife to be who is not Indian to come to the U.S as well. I was just wondering if any body had any experience with this situation and any horror/success stories that you would be willing to share with me as I do not know the likelihood that I will be successful in sponsoring her to come to the U.S with me. Help please.

I'm guessing it would be the same process as a US citizen petitioning to sponsor a spouse,(timeline - one year) or a US permanent resident sponsoring a spouse (timeline about 7 years I think) (are you waiting til after you're married, or before?)

You could check out www.visajourney.com for marriage based immigration information to US.

Hey there people, I am a Canadian Indian and will be moving to the U.S in '09 now under the Jay Treaty, I am allowed to live and work in the U.S and able to sponsor my wife to be who is not Indian to come to the U.S as well. I was just wondering if any body had any experience with this situation and any horror/success stories that you would be willing to share with me as I do not know the likelihood that I will be successful in sponsoring her to come to the U.S with me. Help please.

Not sure if you are still reading this board--not being a Native American, I'm not that familiar with the Jay Treaty, but I seriously considered marrying a Native American woman at one point, so I looked into the Jay Treaty a bit at that time, and do know a bit about it.

As you probably know, you have the right to come to the US and get a green card at any time, but that right does not necessarily extend to your fiancee/wife. Ordinarily it is better to get married before getting your green card, because then the spouse can apply for a derivative green card--even after the fact. If you wait to get married until after you get your own green card, then you must sponsor her--a much longer process.

However, it may be tricky in the case of the Jay Treaty, because with the Jay Treaty you aren't so much applying for a green card as you are claiming a right that you have the right to claim at any time. This actually may make it more difficult for your wife to file a derivative application, because there isn't really a principal application for her to attach herself to--since you yourself don't really have to apply for permanent residency but need merely to claim it. I would recommend considering talking to an attorney familiar with Jay Treaty matters.

Obtaining your own green card and then sponsoring your wife as a spouse of a permanent resident is a pretty sure bet, but as Reba says, it is a long term process. Again depending on the recommendation of an attorney who knows the Jay Treaty, it may be best to get married ASAP and then get your own green card and establish some form of US address so you can get the ball rolling regarding your wife. Since she is Canadian, can she qualify for a US visa in her own right--TN, etc--so that she can easily cross back and forth during the waiting period?

At least as I understand it, the Jay Treaty allows for an immediate and automatic green card, but doesn't provide any faster track for US citizenship after that--the same waiting periods then apply as for anyone else. As such, it may not be any faster to wait for US citizenship and then sponsor your wife. Also obtaining US citizenship requires that you renounce all former allegiances to obtain citizenship. Although you cannot lose your Canadian citizenship in this manner, the laws of your Native nation might be different--so if retaining your Native citizenship is important to you, you may wish to look into that matter.

[oops I forgot that the subject identified your fiancee as Canadian even though the text of the message doesn't--so ignore what I said about the case where she isn't Canadian]

He gets a green card and then he sponsors her for one on I-130. How he got it doesn't really matter. The huge snag is that I-130s for spouses of LPRs take 3-4 years.

But yeah, he needs to talk to someone familiar with it because there may be a way of his spouse benefitting from the treaty provisions.

I found a memo you may find helpful, it addresses your question on page 14 in regards to your spouse and has a good checklist!


http://www.ailanyc.org/bordercrossing%20memo.pdf

He gets a green card and then he sponsors her for one on I-130. How he got it doesn't really matter. The huge snag is that I-130s for spouses of LPRs take 3-4 years.

Almost five years at this point. The current priority date for spouses of LPR's is Dec 1, 2003. It is reaching a point where if the waiting list gets much longer, it will be faster just to wait for US citizenship and sponsor as a US citizen. We aren't quite at that point yet but will be soon if the wait gets much longer--which is why I mentioned the option if US citizenship is something thunder588 would consider.

It's a long road either way.

You're reading the visa bulletin incorrectly, they do more than a year's worth of approvals in a year. You can't just take today's date and minus off the current date on the bulletin, you have to look at the trends. They were up to October 2002 this time last year, so they're doing 14 months of applications every 12 months roughly. Nearly five years, not quite.

Sponsoring as a US citizen if you've just become an LPR will take miles longer because that's another year for the application and citizenship applications take over a year.

You're reading the visa bulletin incorrectly, they do more than a year's worth of approvals in a year. You can't just take today's date and minus off the current date on the bulletin, you have to look at the trends. They were up to October 2002 this time last year, so they're doing 14 months of applications every 12 months roughly. Nearly five years, not quite.

Yes, all other things being equal, your estimate is likely to be more accurate than mine.

The question that arises, though, since it sounds like there is a backlog in processing this kind of case that is now being cleared--is what caused the backlog and therefore whether we should be believe it will continue to be cleared.

Immigration backlogs can arise for two reasons--one is that there are more applicants than the quota for a particular immigrant category, so the additional applicants are, in essence, put on a wait list controlled by the priority date. In this case it would be good to know whether the apparent trend of fewer such applicants has continued from Dec 1, 2003 (the current priority date) up to now.

The other possibility is that immigration officials were swamped (or pretended to be swamped) with other work and so processed fewer approvals than the quota allowed. This happened a lot in the first years after 9/11. It could happen again if a new immigration amnesty is passed by Congress and USCIS must devote its attention to 12 million newly legalized former illegal immigrants--and all other types of cases take a back seat.

[quote= USCIS]Advisory on Processing Times

USCIS has received a significant increase in the number of applications filed. In July and August, nearly 2.5 million applications and petitions of all types were received. This compares to 1.2 million applications and petitions received in the same time period last year. This fiscal year, we received 1.4 million applications for naturalization; nearly double the volume we received the year before. The agency is working to improve processes and focus increased resources, including hiring approximately 1,500 new employees, to address this workload.

As a result, average processing times for certain application types may grow longer. In particular, naturalization applications filed after June 1, 2007 may take approximately 16-18 months to process.

Please note: As of March 11, 2008, processing times for naturalization applications filed after June 1, 2007 have been lowered to 14 to 16 months from 16-18 months to process. Please see the statement of Director Gonzalez in the Related Links section of this page.

USCIS has several informational services to keep you apprised of the agency's progress. We encourage you to take advantage of information posted on our website and to create and monitor your profile in our Case Status Online system to properly track your case. You will find a link to Case Status Online in the Related Links section of this page.

We will continue to provide additional information on application processing times as it becomes available.[/quote]

The backlog is because they can't handle the work load

from The processing timelines page on USCIS

The point is with this is that I reckon the processing time will plummet once they get to the end of that backlog, because there are only so many people who can apply for naturalization.

I have a relative who is worried about this and she can apply sometime around April next year. I reckon her application might actually be quite quick because it's more than 18 months from June 2007 and they will still have the staff.

The only question is whether the new naturalization test will slow things down further.