[freediddy]

You don't know what you're talking about. This is the very last stage of the GC process. Before everyone had the choice to do AOS or CP. I personally chose CP. Now there's only the choice of CP. But nothing else has changed. It means you need to fly back to your home country for a few days for the interview and then you get your GC on the spot.

[airstrike]

The US consulate is currently not hearing cases in 75 countries.

[lelandbatey]

This is only true in the cases for folks on longer visas. If you meet the love of your life and marry them on a tourist visa, you'll be forced to leave your spouse and head back to your country of origin for probably about a year while you wait for USCIS to process I-130.

[TMWNN]

>If you meet the love of your life and marry them on a tourist visa

As others have said, someone entering the US on a tourist or other nonimmigrant visa, then marrying a US citizen, is inherently committing fraud because the marriage demonstrates intent to stay. In the past, the US was nice about it and let people apply to adjust their status without leaving. This loophole is now closed.

[lelandbatey]

You can enter the US on a tourist visa, without any intent to date or meet someone, commiting no fraud, but then encounter someone in the USA, get to know them, and decide to marry that person, and then marry that person. That can happen in 6 months, the length of a tourist visa.

Are you saying that in such cases, the US rules here are and should be that the married couple should live apart for years due to the bylaws of the USCIS?

[TMWNN]

>and then marry that person. That can happen in 6 months, the length of a tourist visa

As I said, this is inherently a violation of the commitment the visitor made when entering the US on a non-immigrant visa, as much as (say) exceeding the limit on the hours per week an international student can work.

>Are you saying that in such cases, the US rules here are and should be that the married couple should live apart for years due to the bylaws of the USCIS?

First, this is what the law has always said; there is a reason why non-immigrant, immigrant, and dual-intent visa types exist. The USCIS memo reiterates this, while clarifying that the agency will no longer grant the contrary-to-the-law leeway it has heretofore done regarding non-immigrant, non dual-intent visas.

Second, the alternatives of 1) K-1 (fiancee) visa or 2) CR-1 (spousal) visa exist, and have always been the intended means for the person you mentioned in your situation.

The leeway meant that pretty much anyone, including illegal aliens, could obtain a green card (and be exempt from removal during the application process) by marrying a US citizen.

A US citizen is free to marry anyone, regardless of citizenship. There is no automatic guarantee, however, that the couple can both live in the US.

[morpheuskafka]

> As I said, this is inherently a violation of the commitment the visitor made when entering the US on a non-immigrant visa, as much as (say) exceeding the limit on the hours per week an international student can work.

Your concept of "commitment" doesn't match the legal structure here. A visa is not a contract with the government. What is relevant legally is whether the information presented was truthful at the time of entry and of visa application.

[lelandbatey]

So, love and families, none of that counts for shit beneath the boots of bureaucracy? Send the kids away from their mother, she didn't navigate the Kafkaesque trap correctly so now we must ruin their lives. Nothing about that seems... Wrong? Because up until yesterday, the policy of the United States was that such a thing WAS wrong.

> A US citizen is free to marry anyone, regardless of citizenship. There is no automatic guarantee, however, that the couple can both live in the US.

While you, like USCIS, may be correct that technically the de-jure rules state that there is no automatic guarantee that spouses cannot both live together in the US, the de-facto reality up until yesterday, for all of living memory is that YES, spouses are guaranteed to be able to live together.

[ericjmorey]

That's such low effort nonsense.

[enraged_camel]

>> You don't know what you're talking about.

I can assure you I am intimately familiar with the entire process.

>> It means you need to fly back to your home country for a few days for the interview and then you get your GC on the spot.

Not necessarily. That's the best and most optimistic scenario. I know of people who have waited weeks, even months. It depends on a lot of factors. And now there will be a lot more people booking interviews at every consulate so expect wait times to skyrocket.