US Immigration from Honduras

My young friend ("Alex") has an approved I-360 Asylum petition. (He turns 13 at the end of 2020.)

We have an I-797 Approval Notice for him.

Alex has a Priority Date of 03/01/2019

Since he is classified as a SIJ (Special Immigrant-Juvenile), he is in the queue for a EB-4 visa.

Further, he is from Honduras, so he is in the EB-4 queue for that country which is not current. The Final Action date for Honduras EB-4 is currently 05/01/2018. (As of Dec 2020)

So... we are unable to submit an I-485 Application for Permanent Residence until the Final Action date for his class and country.

QUESTIONS

1. What is Alex's current legal status? Is he now a legal permanent resident (LPR)? I see in the USCIS Policy Manual, Chapter 7, the following language at the end of the section on Approval:

 "The applicant becomes an LPR as of the date of approval of the adjustment application."

2. Prior to being able to file an I-485, is there any other documentation we should have to prove his status (We have the I-797, but that is all.)

3. Is there any way for him to receive travel permission prior to getting the I-485 and submitting an I-131?

4. Any other thoughts or suggestions?

Hello - I am hoping this is the right forum to find help. If not, please direct me to a better forum.

I am helping a family friend with a 12 year-old who has been APPROVED on the I-390 and now has SIJ status. I am confused about what happens next - the paperwork says he is approved to apply for a green card. Do we file the I-485 and wait? Also - is it possible for him to get travel permission while waiting for the I-485 to be processed? Any help on what we should be doing for "next steps" is appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

I am looking for guidance around the process for the application for a Green Card for an immigrant juvenile. He is 13 years old and was granted an APPROVAL of asylum. The I-797 indicates he is able to apply for legal permanent residence now, but I am uncertain how to proceed.

What is the best forum for discussing the case and how to proceed? Thanks in advance for any guidance.

C

Hey all,

I hope this helps alleviate any anxiety on this topic. Granted every situation is different, I can share my fianc 's story. We were very fortunate that he had a 10 year B1/B2 visa and that he was granted a 6 month stay to come visit me in the US from the middle of September to mid-March. His flight back to Honduras was set for March 16th, with his I-94 set to expire on March 17th. However, COVID happened and panic ensued... Honduras closed their borders completely on March 15th. He was stuck here.

We panicked! We were going to mail our petition in to start our K1 visa process the next day. I called the USCIS and asked them for guidance and talked to a couple of very helpful individuals that stated that likely no action would be taken against him because, COVID. But, if we wanted to play it safe then we should file an extension (I-539)... of course we would always want to play it safe, so we filed the extension online right away with any supporting documents.

At the time the Honduran government made an official statement that the borders would be closed for a week, and at that time they would review and decide if it needed to be closed further. As of that time, there were still flights to Honduras the following week, so we rescheduled his flight for then a week out. We applied for the extension (requesting a month but explaining that he would leave as soon as it was possible). A week went by, and the Honduran government extended their border closures. We were pretty convinced that he would have to stay here and were kicking ourselves for not requesting longer. My fianc was in contact with the Honduran consulate near us in the US and they told us about some repatriation flights. We were able to secure one of those flights ($$$) and he was able to leave the US on March 30th (13 days past his I-94, much shorter I imagine than most cases but this was ours).

We got an update (notified from one of the case tracking apps) on September 18th that a biometrics appointment was made. My heart dropped, we didn't know if this would be considering abandonment of the extension request because he was not in the US anymore. I probably stressed myself out way more than I needed to, but did find some information on some old threads of VJ that it was a possibility to do biometrics outside of the US for extreme circumstances if there was a USCIS field office nearby in his country that could perform the biometrics. We were just hoping that would work out and decided to wait for the notification with the biometrics appointment on it to come, as I read that there should be instructions about obtaining biometrics if now outside of the US.

I'm going to assume that an officer looked into our case and saw that my fianc was able to leave on March 30th. We just got another notification on the case tracking app today that his extension was approved! No biometrics! They approved the extension from March 17th-March 30th (obviously they saw that he was able to exit the US on the 30th). We are super thankful and thrilled that this news came just as they have started adjudicating the K1 visas just ahead of ours. We were so worried (though I realize how silly it is) that this was going to affect our K1 case.

Again, I realize our extension likely doesn t look like every other case and the extension ended up being for such a short amount of time, but hopefully this will help someone.

March 16, 2020 - Filed extension (I-539) online with immediate notice

March 17, 2020 - Date of I-94 Expiration

September 18, 2020 - Notice that biometrics appointment was made (6 months, 2 days!!)

September 24, 2020 - Case Approved - No Biometrics done

My husband entered into the U.S on Saturday, September 13th. His passport was stamped but I just found out it was not stamped with the stamp that allow for working. Has this ever happened to anyone and any suggestions on how to fix this? He had a phone interview today for a job, but they can't continue with his employment due to not have the correct stamp to act as a temporary green card.