USC adopting minor child

[Deb+Steve 13]

Just wondering if anyone has been through this before the ROC. My USC husband is adopting my daughter. We are supposed to remove conditions in about 11 months. Do we still have to remove the conditions on the CR2 and then file the N600 for her or can we file the N600 as soon as the adoption is finalised?

TIA ... any advice would be greatly appreciate.

[Harsh_77 716]

Somebody can correct me, but your husband can't adopt your daughter.

She would be his step-daughter anyways.

For USC to adopt kid from any other country kid has to be orphan, either of the parents cannot be alive.

He will have to petition for your daughter as a step-daughter.

[Deputy Purple 1,294]

Somebody can correct me, but your husband can't adopt your daughter.

She would be his step-daughter anyways.

For USC to adopt kid from any other country kid has to be orphan, either of the parents cannot be alive.

He will have to petition for your daughter as a step-daughter.

I don't know about other States but in Illinois I'm allowed to adopt my Wife's sons one they've lived in the State as an LPR for 6 months. It's called Step-Parent Adoption and is common across the US.

[OKflyboy 35]

he absolutely CAN adopt. It's step-parent adoption and very common. We're doing the same thing. The child has to be a permanent resident and automatically becomes a USC once adoption is finalized. I'm not sure about conditional status, but I think it should not matter.

[NickD 202]

I adopted a 2 year old boy and his sister that was one year, the one surviving parent wanted to do adopt them and even paid the court cost. But the court elected to wait a year in case of a change of heart, the kids were living with me during that time. We were issued new birth certificates, I was the father. But these were USA born kids and in the USA.

I did look into adopting my stepdaughter, first was told by an attorney, that cannot be done here, has to be done in the child's home country. While my wife was in favor, would also need permission from the other biological parent. Was also told by attorneys in her home country would take at least six years plus a lot of money. Another law of that country was the child had to be under 16 years of age at the time of the adoption, as she was already 14, impossible to conform to that law.

Just saying a lot depends upon the laws of that country and each is different. A friend did adopt an orphan baby girl in Ethiopia, he and his wife had to maintain residency in that country for three months, then another three after that. It took them over a year before they could finally bring that "unwanted child" here, and cost them something like $35,000.00 plus lost wages.

You're husband should contact an adoption attorney to first find out if that child can be adopted here, if not, then contact attorneys in the child's home country. I only got as far as asking questions and getting unreasonable answers.

[Deb+Steve 13]

Thank you everyone for your responses. I spoke with the Australian Embassy who told me that because we were LPR, we would need to follow the guidelines for our state. We would not need to do anything in Australia.

I spoke with a lawyer and the county court and have all the information to proceed. The only grey area is the removal of conditions for her CR2. I thought she would automatically become a citizen as long as the adoption was done via a US court. Immigration is telling me that we cannot file the N600 until we have removed the conditions for her.

I guess it's not the adoption that's confusing, it's what happens with immigration that is.

[NickD 202]

Confusing it is, maybe I didn't look into it far enough, but too late now, but was told even though my stepdaughter was a LPR, still had to go through the adoption in her home country. This stepdad stuff was all new to me, did learn if anything happened to my, my stepkid wouldn't receive any SS benefits, and if our marriage ended up in a divorce, wouldn't be liable for child support payments.

But if she was naughty and under the age of 18, would be liable for her. Probably why I quickly came to the conclusion we have a country run by idiots.

Now when I adopted those two kids, they completely destroyed their original birth certificates, and the new birth certificates looked exactly like they were my natural born children, I even changed their names. But thinking about it, one thing they did not change was the hospital they were born at, but was in the USA in our case. Now I wonder if they are going to do the same thing with your child? In which case, immigration would be involved. This is something for you to check into.

Can realize the frustration, contact six different attorneys, get six different responses, call six different people at the USCIS, same thing. With state issues, did dig into state statues on other issues and for every state statue, you can find one that completely contradicts it. At times I feel they should burn everything up and start from scratch. 235 years of politicians is too much!

[Deb+Steve 13]

I hear ya. Will keep you posted when/if I find any sort of clarification on the ROC.

[Ontarkie 13,915]

When we were looking into my husband adopting we found out we that not only did you have to deal with 2 countries laws but we would have to also make sure we followed the Hague convention, so if you're from a country that is part of the Hague convention there is lots to look into and most lawyers don't know about it. With out going through all those steps the adoption most likely wont be recognized.

[NickD 202]

One thing for sure, you sure don't need a Ph.D. to have a kid. Was dealing with Venezuela with massive poverty in that country, can't even feed their kids nor give them proper medical care. My stepdaughter wasn't in that situation, she had a hard working educated mom. But wouldn't have that anymore, working for an American based company that was kicked out by Chavez. Over 60% of that country is in massive poverty, but it cost me a small fortune just to get her legally out of there. Needed those papers for the USCIS, adoption was absolutely out of the question.

She did want to go back to visit her brother, we are still trying desperately to get me out of there, but would have no problem entering, but just couldn't get out again. So she had to wait until she was 18 years of age to do that. This is what I mean about 201 different countries.

In this situation, is there a biological father involved? In our situation, there was, not even living in that country, he abandoned his daughter a long time ago, like six years before I met my wife. But even with my wife having full custody and after a long time, him giving permission for his daughter to leave the country, that wasn't enough, still needed his permission each time she would try to leave that country. He wouldn't even give his permission for his daughter to renew her passport. The only way we got his permission for her to leave Venezuela, was either to pay six years of back child support payments, plus four more years or sign the paper and we would forgive that. He elected to give his permission, but that paper was worthless of us trying to renew her passport with the Venezuelan Consulate, even though he gave up all of his rights to his child.

In attempting adoption, there very least most insignificant concern, is the welfare of that child, but making it positively difficult and extremely expensive is not. I still don't know if you succeed if that place of birth will still be an issue on that new birth certificate. Having enough difficulty with that place of birth on US passports.

Did manage to stay alive until she reached 18, so receiving SS payments is no longer an issue, and not even the slightest issue on divorcing her mom. Time took care of that. But in regards to our relationship, I am definitely her adopted dad, whether we have the paper work or not.