cr1 Overseas foreign fiance to be married, want to bring her in. a few questions.

[chris12345 0]

Hello,

 

My fiance is overseas (Ukraine) and I, US citizen, want to bring her in. I know by now that there are two options: 1. the fiance visa (K1) and 2. the spouse visa (marriage first) (CR1). In addition to these, she is thinking of applying for an F1 visa as she wants to study further (in this case marriage will be delayed). My questions are the following:

1. Is it true that the K1 visa is faster than the CR1?

2. Can a person in K1 visa attend university? (I already read that can't work)

3. Is it true that in K1 visa the chances accept-deny lately (with the new administration) are 50-50?

4. If F1 visa is pursued, could one apply also for CR1? (the result of F1 can be found out very soon unlike the one of CR1).

 

Thank you very much! 

[mushroomspore 3,043]

20 minutes ago, chris12345 said:

 

1. Is it true that the K1 visa is faster than the CR1?

2. Can a person in K1 visa attend university? (I already read that can't work)

3. Is it true that in K1 visa the chances accept-deny lately (with the new administration) are 50-50?

4. If F1 visa is pursued, could one apply also for CR1? (the result of F1 can be found out very soon unlike the one of CR1).

 

Thank you very much! 

1. Not really. The K1 visa takes 8-10 months. But after that you have the adjustment of status phase (AoS; green card application) and that takes 1+ year on average. So from K1 to green card, total time can be 1.5-2 years. Compare that to CR1, which takes 12-16ish months. No adjustment phase. She would be a permanent resident upon entry and would be allowed to work and travel right away. Green card comes 2-3 weeks after. CR1 is less expensive too since there is no adjustment phase.

 

2. Not sure about this. I THINK most places do allow adjustment applicants to enroll. So you'd have to wait for her to file her green card papers (that is, if you do the K1 process). You would have to ask the specific institutions about their policy on this. If she did CR1, she would be a permanent resident after entry and free to study anywhere. Another advantage of CR1.

 

3. LOL what?? Sorry but that is ridiculous. It is more dependent on the specific embassy/consulate since some countries are high fraud etc. Dunno much about Ukraine specifically but I don't see any reason for complications. If you guys have seen each other in person a good amount and have kept evidence of that, there isn't much to worry about. 

 

4. Forget about the F1. F1 is non-immigrant. By applying, she would be declaring her intentions to leave the US after her studies are done. That is obviously not her plan at all. The point of a visa is that it is used to enter the US for a specific country. She cannot be granted an immigrant visa to enter the US if she is already present in the US on a non-immigrant visa. If she had been already present on F1 and you decided to get married, then you would pursue AoS. AoS is not for granting visas; it is, as the name says, adjusting status WITHIN the US. This is why K1's have to do it: because their status upon entry is fiancè(e) but then they become the spouse of a US citizen, which makes them eligible for a green card. Forget the F1. Pursue CR1 and in a year or so, she will be free to study wherever she wants and can pay domestic student fees rather than the outrageous international student fees.

Edited November 5, 2018 by mushroomspore

[Boiler 43,429]

1 Yes, a bit

2. Well I know in my State illegals can so assume yes.

3. No

4. Yes

 

[DaveAndAnastasia 2,078]

1. Currently it's about 9 months on average from NOA1 to interview for a K-1, and about 13 months on average from NOA1 to interview for a CR-1. Note that these are averages. Your case may take more or less time. If your case does take a long time, that does not necessarily mean doing the other would have been faster; I believe it's likely anything that delays processing a K-1 would also delay a CR-1 and vis versa.

2. Assuming you're referring to the period before adjusting status (AOS) or getting work authorization (EAD), there's nothing preventing someone from attending college or university. However, you'll probably be paying out of state tuition at a state school, if not international student tuition.

3. Except for cases from certain high-fraud countries, virtually all K-1s are approved eventually; this is still the case; denial rates have not changed significantly in the last two years as far as I know.

 

It seems like you're already aware your fiancée can work and travel internationally right away on a CR-1, while she cannot on a K-1.

[chris12345 0]

Guys about number 3: please check this upon which i based my question: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/trump-cuts-fiancee-visas-by-one-third

basically it says 33% were cut last year and also an additional 20% was cut in the interview stage which means more than 50% was cut last year!

 

[mushroomspore 3,043]

3 minutes ago, chris12345 said:

Guys about number 3: please check this upon which i based my question: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/trump-cuts-fiancee-visas-by-one-third

basically it says 33% were cut last year and also an additional 20% was cut in the interview stage which means more than 50% was cut last year!

 

Except this article does not provide specific statistics detailing WHICH countries the denials come from. It is most likely that most of the denials are coming from high fraud countries anyway.

[DaveAndAnastasia 2,078]

The Washington Examiner is not a real newspaper.

[chris12345 0]

Just now, DaveAndAnastasia said:

The Washington Examiner is not a real newspaper.

Oh I really had no idea! So that means this is totally untrustworthy, right?

[mushroomspore 3,043]

[Deleted]

Edited November 5, 2018 by mushroomspore

[Boiler 43,429]

Total tosh as anybody half familiar with the process would instantly recognise.

[geowrian 22,335]

#FakeNews

The "factual" data is just outright wrong.

"The K-1 decision numbers are now much different than they were in the past. There are two sets of them. The first deals with the initial step in the process, the petition. In FY 2016, USCIS approved 90.5 percent of the petitions it received; then in FY 2017, which was mostly under the Trump administration, that figure fell to 66.2 percent."

https://www.uscis.gov/tools/reports-studies/immigration-forms-data/data-set-all-uscis-application-and-petition-form-types

 

" The second step — the one involving the overseas interview — showed in the latest data available that in FY 2016 the denial rate was about 20 percent, a huge increase from the 2015 rate of less than 1 percent. Bear in mind that the 20 percent denial rate was laid on cases that had been 100 percent cleared by USCIS. The two agencies are moving in the same direction with, State backstopping DHS. "

https://travel.state.gov/content/dam/visas/Statistics/Non-Immigrant-Statistics/NIVWorkload/FY2015NIVWorkloadbyVisaCategory.pdf

https://travel.state.gov/content/dam/visas/Statistics/Non-Immigrant-Statistics/NIVWorkload/FY2016NIVWorkloadbyVisaCategory.pdf

https://travel.state.gov/content/dam/visas/Statistics/Non-Immigrant-Statistics/NIVWorkload/FY2017NIVWorkloadbyVisaCategory.pdf

2015/2016/2017 Initial Approval Rates: 70.5%    63.1%    62.9%

2015/2016/2017 Final Approval Rates (includes initially refused visas): 86.4%    83.4%    84.9%

These are certainly nowhere near the numbers claimed, and are all within historically consistent rates. The slight decreases are nothing out of the norm.

The claimed <1% refusal rate was likely based on the old reports which only counted K-1s that initially approved by the IV unit but then refused by the NIV unit (very rare and not indicative of actual refusals).

[chris12345 0]

Guys: For the K1 scenario, let's say everything goes well and fiance comes in with this visa and lets say marriage takes place asap. Does that mean that we can apply for adjustment right away? Does that mean that after this application she can work/attend university? Or not? If not, what she is supposed to do? Looking at the house walls?

[geowrian 22,335]

3 minutes ago, chris12345 said:

Guys: For the K1 scenario, let's say everything goes well and fiance comes in with this visa and lets say marriage takes place asap. Does that mean that we can apply for adjustment right away? Does that mean that after this application she can work/attend university? Or not? If not, what she is supposed to do? Looking at the house walls?

Once married (do so within 90 days of entry on the K-1), you can file for AOS.

 

Work authorization is via an EAD (I-765). ETA: ~4-6 months right now.

A travel document to leave and return is via AP (I-131). ETA: ~4-6 months as well.

Both can be filed with no additional fee (on top of the AOS fee) with the AOS application.

She can attend school, although it'####### or miss if the institution will treat them as a resident or international student (much, much higher costs).

The inability to work right away - and in some states not able to drive for months - is a significant drawback of the K-1 visa.

If the aboce is not acceptable, then you can marry (anywhere) and do a CR-1 visa instead. It has none of the issues above and doesn't need to do AOS. It also only takes a few months longer than a K-1 to obtain nowadays.

[chris12345 0]

5 minutes ago, geowrian said:

 

Guys certainly a great advice and yes it seems the best way other than the longer waiting time. Another question: I checked the statistics of people who apply for K1/CR1, and the vast majority still chooses K1 over CR1. Why does this happen?

[DaveAndAnastasia 2,078]

2 minutes ago, chris12345 said:

Guys certainly a great advice and yes it seems the best way other than the longer waiting time. Another question: I checked the statistics of people who apply for K1/CR1, and the vast majority still chooses K1 over CR1. Why does this happen?

A few reasons

1 - Until last year, K-1s were significantly faster in most cases, so there's information lag as old information online pretty much never goes away.

2 - Many people want to be together to stay as soon as possible regardless of any other factors.

3 - How AOS works is not very well known to people who don't follow the process closely.

4 - A lot of people are a lot more comfortable spending six months to a year living apart while engaged than while actually married.

5 - Complications involved in actually getting married in some countries can significantly increase the time difference between the two processes (if Anastasia and I were going to do a CR-1, we almost certainly would have had to marry somewhere other than Russia due to what it takes to marry a foreigner in Russia, and Russians can't easily get visitor visas to the US, so it would have had to be in a third country).