US Immigration from Philippines

I'm a petitioner living in Florida and my spouse beneficiary (j1 visa holder) is currently living in Tennessee for a work internship. We are filing both i-130 and i-485.

My question is: Are we still allowed to file concurrently?

I was planning on sending both applications together; however, the two states have different lockboxes. Do I need to send the i-130 to one lockbox, wait for notice they received the application, then send the i-485 to the other lockbox?

Also, I'm planning on putting her current residence on questions 61.a & b regarding where she will apply for adjustment of status. However, by the time this gets approved she might be back home with me.

I appreciate the help!

Hi all,

Over the two years or so I've been a member here, following different topics, I've seen the topic of police clearance certificates and expiration dates come up not infrequently at least as memory serves. It seems I've usually read advice that police clearance certificates do not have an expiration date, provided you have not returned to the country of issuance since the PCC's issuance. As noted on the State Department's traveldocs site, the direction is pretty clear.

However, as yet another cautionary tale, my wife had her IR1 interview on September 23rd, and she was given a 221(g) for an expired PCC. We're now in this endless loop of administrative processing, likely looking at a new medical exam, hopefully with no sputum flag, and hopefully USEM will respond before the updated PCC expires again. Some people are rolling on 3 months post-221(g) submission and still have no response.

Here's the thing, which others may have known but some didn't point out: On the traveldocs site, it does state that PCCs are valid for two years unless they are from a country of former residence and you have not returned there since they were issued. However, in the country-specific sections, if you don't read carefully, you might miss what I missed, which was written amongst all the text that Qatar PCCs expire after six months. Her PCC does have that written on it, but we assumed with advice from here and elsewhere, as well as the traveldocs directions, that it wouldn't be considered expired for the visa application process, particularly since she hadn't left the Philippines, let alone been back to Qatar. We thought it was bulletproof.

So, I imagine this is how one Pilipina with an "expired" Qatar PCC could be two counters down from my wife and walk away with an "approval," while my wife and two other Pilipinas at her counter walked away with 221(g)s (theirs weren't from Qatar).

There is zero consistency, and nothing is certain.

Best of luck to everyone. I really do hope your journeys are less problematic than ours has been.

Hello everyone my name is Rocelle and I am trying to bring my dad here in America, he is green card holder but he went to the Philippines? he is there since 2021 till 2024 how can we bring him back to America.

So, I've been asking my wife the civics questions and she is getting pretty good but one of the easiest questions was giving her trouble. Name a war the US fought in the 1800s.

She would say the Civil War sometimes but often one of the World Wars or whatever. I kept saying, Why don't you just remember the easiest one, the War of 1812.

After telling her that several times she started getting mad.

Finally, last night, we figured out she thought I wanted her to say the war that was in 1812 and didn't know the War of 1812 was the name of a war.

Has anyone noticed any difference in the time it takes for an application to be officially "received" between the USPS PO Box addresses and the courier addresses at the lockboxes? We are getting ready to send in our AOS package to the Phoenix lockbox and are wondering if it will make a difference wether we send it to the PO Box via USPS Priority Express or to the physical address via Fed-Ex. Anyone have experience or even an opinion? Any responses would be greatly appreciated!