J1 Spouse needs 2 year hhr waiver. AOS Pending

[hopkinscarving 0]

J1 visa holder subject to 2 year home residency requirement married US citizen in November. In December we filed for AOS with i485, i130, and applied for Advance Parole travel document. On 485 we mistakenly indicated that J1 visa holder was not subject to 2 year hrr, so they accepted our application.

*We did not know at the time that J1 visa holder was subject to 2 year hrr, so we did not apply for a waiver with DOS and Indonesian Government.

In mid January we recieved a request for innitial evidence regarding i864.

We spoke with a lawyer who advised us to try to get a waiver to 2 year hrr before we proceed with the AOS. Since it is stalled until we respond to FRE, is there any possibility that if we can get approval of the waiver that our AOS will also be approved?

My wife misses her family in Indonesia a great deal. She lost her sister and grandmother last summer and her father is going blind. She has not been home for 2 years now. We canceled an Infopass appointment at the local USCIS office where we were going to submit 131 emergency travel document with paperwork regarding her father's condition from Indonesian Hospital. The lawyer said that it would probably be better to try to get the DOS waiver before we try to travel on 131.

Does anyone have advise for how to sort out this mess? The lawyer said we're pretty much in a gray area and have to tread carefully. I'm preparing to submit the waiver application to DOS and request for NOS from Indonesian embassy. Any tips for that process? Any possibility we could travel on i-131 while our waiver application is pending?

Time is an issue for my wife, she desperately wants to see her family, but our biggest concern is being able to stay together the next few years and not be separated. I appreciate any advise from people who have had similar circumstances.

[Pitaya 2,577]

~Moved from Fam.-based AOS to WStudentT-based AOS Forum~

~Adjusting from J1 visa~