Huge confusion regarding marriage/K1/AoS after speaking to lawyer

[JayeBird 117]

Stick with visa journey - you'll get better advise here.... free of cost.

Most lawyer  (most, not all) will only confuse you.

[chiggins82 87]

I don't think it's dumb to consider a K-1. It depends on your situation. I agree with what everyone else is saying. You can come to the US as a tourist and marry then go home and file CR1. Technically you can stay, but you are right that it does put you at some risk.

 

If you don't want to live apart after marrying, then K1 might be better for you. If that doesn't matter, then CR1 is a little more direct to getting permanent residency. Consider the timelines for both K1 and CR1 while planning too. When we made our decision, K1 was a faster path to have me living in the US so that factored into our decision. I think it takes longer for me to have a 10 yr green card then if I just planned CR1, but I was more concerned with living with my fiance/husband than green card timelines.

 

Lastly, someone else commented on this and I agree. Watch out if you plan to come to the US on a tourist visa for marriage. Even in Canada that can be seen as a suspicion. I remember a news story about a woman who was traveling with a wedding dress to the US as a tourist and she was denied entry because she couldn't prove that she did not intend to stay.

 

As long as you plan well it should be fine (Travel with evidence of ties to home, return ticket, etc etc.) you should be fine, but I would have a back up plan just in the small chance of problems. 

 

 

[jakejon 1,196]

It's sad to see that lawyers are still pushing for VWP people to do this, hands down it is visa fraud. We were told the same story and saw right through it. Besides putting yourself in a circumstance where you will have very limited options if something goes wrong, you will make things much harder for yourself while you wait for your EAD.

 

Going this route, you will have no solid ground to receive a SSN until you have an EAD. You will have an uphill battle to be added your partners health insurance as you will likely not have a SSN during the special enrollment period for their health plan, as well as issues dealing with any financial institution or receiving any sort of ID or driving license (state dependent of course). This is what killed it for us. The intentions of going this route is to skirt the law, which is wrong, and your hands will be tied for about 4 months that you are in limbo waiting for the EAD. 

 

You also have to think, a lawyer will benefit if something were to go wrong, they will only get more money from you to solve it. Either find a credible lawyer who will help you out according to the law, or use Visa Journey as your guide to a spousal visa. I recommend using Visa Journey as our lawyer only ended up muddying up everything so far.  

 

Besides all this, its a bit of a fun adventure going through the time apart waiting for the visa, meeting up in different places, seeing new things together. It is stressful, but it can really make your relationship flourish! I've seen so many exciting places this past year when we met up. 

 

Good luck!

 

[Boiler 43,543]

I think the issue here is changing your mind and adjusting after having entered without that intent.

 

Many, most Lawyers will mention that option, perhaps the subtlety is lost.

[WeGuyGal 1,052]

Shady legal advice

[Mrsjackson 300]

21 hours ago, Klam said:

I just finished a phone consultation with an immigration lawyer (wanted to ask about the possibility of a TN status while an immigration petition was pending) and am left very confused regarding certain matters.  

 

I am a USC living in New York and my fiance is a Canadian citizen living in Toronto.  We are currently planning for her to travel to New York in the next couple weeks on a visitor status, get married, and then have her return to Toronto.  Afterwards, we will file an I-130 with the goal of getting a CR-1 immigration visa via consular processing.  I was just told by this lawyer that this is not possible, and that she needs a K-1 in order to travel to the US for marriage purposes.  This is not my understanding of things at all.

 

Furthermore, she claims that if she were to travel to the US as a visitor and get married at city hall, she could just stay here while we file the I-130, I-485, and adjust status.  My understanding is this is visa fraud and could make huge problems for us.  She states that although she's not supposed to travel to the US with immigration intent, it's not hard for her to just tell USCIS that it was a spontaneous decision to get married and stay here and that they usually don't question this for a USC spouse.

 

I am left very suspicious about this advice as this goes completely against everything I understand about the process.  Could somebody here please clarify?

You know a lot more than your lawyer

[dentsflogged 352]

6 hours ago, chiggins82 said:

I don't think it's dumb to consider a K-1. It depends on your situation. I agree with what everyone else is saying. You can come to the US as a tourist and marry then go home and file CR1. Technically you can stay, but you are right that it does put you at some risk.

 

If you don't want to live apart after marrying, then K1 might be better for you. If that doesn't matter, then CR1 is a little more direct to getting permanent residency. Consider the timelines for both K1 and CR1 while planning too. When we made our decision, K1 was a faster path to have me living in the US so that factored into our decision. I think it takes longer for me to have a 10 yr green card then if I just planned CR1, but I was more concerned with living with my fiance/husband than green card timelines.

 

Lastly, someone else commented on this and I agree. Watch out if you plan to come to the US on a tourist visa for marriage. Even in Canada that can be seen as a suspicion. I remember a news story about a woman who was traveling with a wedding dress to the US as a tourist and she was denied entry because she couldn't prove that she did not intend to stay.

 

As long as you plan well it should be fine (Travel with evidence of ties to home, return ticket, etc etc.) you should be fine, but I would have a back up plan just in the small chance of problems. 

 

 

This is the most well thought out answer here. 

 

Plenty on this forum will say the K-1 is a terrible all around choice.  Generally speaking people should research BOTH the K1 and CR-1 options and decide what's best for their personal circumstance.

 

I'm from a WVP country and the number of people "in the know" who have said that we're idiots for going the K-1 route is insane.  What they don't take into account is personal circumstances. Travel from Australia to the USA is expensive and takes a huge amount of time (32 hours from door to door for us). Many people (my fiance included) do not get a lot of time off work and being able to schedule time off at the same time to get to a 3rd country to marry is all but impossible.  So we go K-1 because it means we didn't have to wait another 9 months from when we decided to get married (the first time both our work schedules align for us to take time off work) to get married then start the ~12 month CR-1 process (assuming it hasn't gotten even longer by then). 

 

OP talk to your fiancee and decide what's best for you. There's pros and cons to both visa options and only you guys know which option is going to best suit your personal circumstances. 

[Mrsjackson 300]

6 hours ago, dentsflogged said:

This is the most well thought out answer here. 

 

Plenty on this forum will say the K-1 is a terrible all around choice.  Generally speaking people should research BOTH the K1 and CR-1 options and decide what's best for their personal circumstance.

 

I'm from a WVP country and the number of people "in the know" who have said that we're idiots for going the K-1 route is insane.  What they don't take into account is personal circumstances. Travel from Australia to the USA is expensive and takes a huge amount of time (32 hours from door to door for us). Many people (my fiance included) do not get a lot of time off work and being able to schedule time off at the same time to get to a 3rd country to marry is all but impossible.  So we go K-1 because it means we didn't have to wait another 9 months from when we decided to get married (the first time both our work schedules align for us to take time off work) to get married then start the ~12 month CR-1 process (assuming it hasn't gotten even longer by then). 

 

OP talk to your fiancee and decide what's best for you. There's pros and cons to both visa options and only you guys know which option is going to best suit your personal circumstances. 

I agree with this. You do get a lot of people on here who completely dismiss the K1 as inferior, but it completely depends on the situation. At our time of filing it was a tremendously faster option, and with a baby together (meaning I am staying at home for a couple years anyway and don’t necessarily need to be able to work right away) getting to each other as fast as possible was the priority. It’s not a one size fits all. Everyone’s circumstances are different and for some the K1 is the better option. 

[Boiler 43,543]

I did the K1

 

Would not be my choice if I was doing it again.

[geowrian 22,335]

My wife did the K-1. I'm still not sure if it was the best option. It was definitely the fastest option since there was no way I would have been able to marry her after proposing (nor did I want to go from proposal to marriage so quickly) for at least several months. The drawback of the period between arrival and getting her EAD was definitely a challenge, though.

[Klam 24]

Thanks for the responses everybody.  We've finalized our decision for a CR1.  We're already well versed on pros and cons of a K1 vs CR1 (I actually posted a topic about this a while back where we were actually leaning towards a K1).  I was just thrown off balance when a supposed legal specialist made all these strange claims.

[TBoneTX 43,157]

The OP indicates satisfaction with the answers.  Amidst many proper answers (meaning OK to come to marry as long as return home afterwards), there's advice that violates the site's Terms of Service, so this thread is now closed to further comment.