Has anyone out there had any experience applying and/or receiving a multi-entry B2 tourist visa for their Russian spouse before starting the immigration process? We are not ready to relocate to the States (we live in Ukraine), but I would like for him to be able to travel with me to America to meet my family and for vacations once a year.

Is it possible? We own a house in both our names in Ukraine, but other than that, he has no ties to Russia or Ukraine except for a mother. His sister is marrying an American and in the K1 process.

Also, I am a missionary here. I am not sure if that will make a difference or not.

Applying yes, receiving no. Young single people who can be considered "New Russians", might have a chance, but otherwise your chances are slim to none in my opinion.

Your best bet is to have your family meet him there or to meet in a "neutral" country where there are no visa issues for either of you.

Even when the USC spouse lives abroad as well?

For starters it is a hard burden to prove even for our VWP countries. Remember the DS-156 asks if you have any relationship to anyone in the US or has anyone filed an immigrant petition on your behalf. So my biased opinion stands. It's very hard to do. But if you have a spare $100 and a few weeks, you can always try.

If you try, let us know what happens. I think its really unlikely to work, but you might have a better chance if you can show that the USC must return to Russia for ongoing missionary work. This might go toward proving the required lack of intent by the Russian husband to immigrate.

...especially if you are already married. When you fill out a visa application, and answer "yes" to the question "Do you have any relatives in the US?", and this relative is a spouse, the Consular Officer will immediately consider you a potential immigrant, even if you are not. And in this case, even if he had a million strong ties to Russia, it wouldn't matter.

This is just my opinion though

Good point!

Just wanted to add an update to this....

Went to the Kyiv Consulate to apply for I-130 and asked the question about the chances of receiving a tourist visa for my husband since we are not moving to the US at this time and are concerned about meeting the requirements for the greencard.

The consular officers there told us that we had a strong case to receive a tourist visa and that in their years of working in different embassies in the FSU, they had seen several people lose their greencards at POE and be deported after returning once a year to keep their greencard current (for example, the second and third year in a row that people tried to do this). They said if we filed and we received a greencard it would be better to return every 6 mos to avoid problems.

They strongly recommended that we wait on filing the I-130 and that we try for a tourist visa first since I have lived in Ukraine for several years and we own a house here in both our names and we have work here.

We will probably not apply for the tourist visa until the beginning of next year. But I will let you guys know if we get it when we do apply. Hopefully, this is all true.... but the worst case scenario is that we just file the I-130 if we don't get the tourist visa.

I know I'm off-topping here, but you seem to live in Ukraine, and you have "Russia" in your profile. Is your husband a Russian citizen?

Yes. His family is originally from Ukraine, but moved to Siberia before the fall of the Soviet Union.

The people who advised you, are they the same people that make the decisions on whether or not to grant a tourist visa? Also, is he going through Moscow or Kyiv? Could make a big difference as well. Moscow has almost a "zero tolerance" policy for non-affluent single young folks. Kyiv could be different. (And probably the better option if available.)

It is well within your right as a member of the Russia forum to get off topic you go girl