Family Sponsored Immigration By Charles M. Samaha
There are many ways for Aliens to immigrate lawfully to the United States to obtain their Permanent Residence-or what is colloquially known as the “Green Card” (technically known as the I-551). (As an aside, the I-551 card is no longer “green”, but the term has stuck.) Permanent Residence is the ability to live and work lawfully in the United States without having to return to the Alien’s home country within a specific time frame. This article’s focus is on family-based immigration.
There are four main categories of persons who can sponsor an Alien family member who are subject to numerical limitations:
1) A U.S. Citizen can sponsor an unmarried son or daughter. This is the 1st Preference category;
2) A U.S. Permanent Resident can sponsor his/her spouse and an unmarried son or daughter under 21 years of age. These persons are placed in category 2A. An unmarried child or daughter of a U.S. Permanent Resident who is 21 years of age or older is placed in category 2B;
3) A U.S. Citizen can sponsor a married son or daughter. This is the 3rd Preference category; and
4) A U.S. Citizen can sponsor his/her brother or sister. This is the 4th Preference category.
There is also an immediate relative category, which is without numerical limitation. These persons include a spouse or parent of a U.S. Citizen. A U.S. citizen child can only apply for his/her parents if the child is at least 21 years of age. (So a child born in the U.S. becomes a citizen by virtue of birth in the U.S., even if born to Alien parents. The child can not apply for his/her parents until the child is 21.) A step-child of a U.S. citizen is considered an immediate relative if the marriage that created the relationship occurred before the child’s 18th birthday. (I am excluding any discussion on adopted children and fiancés. These issues can be complex and encompass entire articles on their own.)
There are numerical limitations to the four main categories discussed above since the Government only issues a certain amount of visas each year in a particular family category and there are more persons filing each year than visas are allotted. For instance, the Government may only be required to issue 23,400 visas for the 1st Preference Category and there might be 50,000 applications filed in a fiscal year. As one can imagine, a back log begins to develop. A back log can further develop because of the lack of person-power to handle all the incoming applications.
Each preference category is assigned a monthly priority date. For all countries in the World (excluding India, Mexico and the Philippines as they have their own set of priority dates) the November 2008 priority dates are as follows:
Category 1: May 1 2002
Category 2A: February 8 2004
Category 2B: January 15 2000
Category 3: July 1 2000
Category 4: November 15 1997
For example, assume a U.S. citizen applies for her unmarried Canadian son this year and the petition was approved and assigned a priority date of November 1, 2008. The approval of the petition by itself does not vest any rights in the Canadian son to immigrate to the U.S. until his priority date becomes available. The November 2008 1st Category priority date is only at May 1, 2002. Thus, this son could wait many years in Canada until his priority date becomes available. Also, even though the Department of State issues new priority dates monthly does not mean that the priority date moves up each month. In fact, sometimes the family-based priority dates regress.
However, immediate relatives are not subject to the numerical limitation. Thus, if a U.S. citizen marries a Russian spouse, the couple can immediately file the necessary applications at the Immigration & Naturalization sub-office in Tampa. This is called adjustment of status. In other words, the Alien can complete the entire application process in the U.S. without any need to return to the home country to complete the process at a U.S. embassy.
Ok, got all that. So there are no categories that allow a cousin to apply for a cousin; for an uncle or aunt to apply for a nephew or niece; for a grandparent to apply for a grandchild; or for a person to apply for her mother or father-in-law. Also, as you can well imagine, there are pitfalls and exceptions to the generalities I have laid out for you. I hope that the article has given you some insight to the wonders of immigration.