US Immigration from Romania

Hello fellow VisaJourney-ers!

I (USC) filed an I-130 for my mom on September 1st, 2024.

First month - "myProgress" tab showed "4 months to case decision".

Second month - it jumped to 17 months. Fair enough - Vermont Service Center.

Steadily decreasing every month and it got to 7 months this month.

Yesterday I get an email "we have taken an action on your case". I go in myUSCIS, status was saying "Case is still being processed by USCIS" with the same "7 months" under myProgress.

But.... I go into my Documents and here it is... a gleaming I-130 APPROVAL NOTICE PDF. Saying "we have approved your petition, case is being transferred to NVC." Yay. There is an inconsistency on the notice, it says that I said in the i-130 both that she will interview at the embassy, AND that she will apply for Adjustment of Status from the US, and that, because her last address is in our home country, the case will go the NVC-embassy route. Mind you, I did NOT say in the petition that she would apply for Adjustment of Status from the US (I double checked the petition - I ONLY said she will interview at the embassy). Anyway, whatever. Today I go into myUSCIS again, the approval notice is still there, but the myProgress now says "time until case decision - 20 months". Questions:

- How long until it will show the correct status?

- How long until case gets to NVC? AI is giving me 1-2 months

- How long until documentarily qualified and case sent to embassy?

- We did my I-130 (spousal visa) back in 2019-2020 and we dragged the NVC part because of how we were planning our move to the US, and the Bucharest embassy at the time had basically zero backlog (I got an interview date almost as soon as we were documentarily qualified)... anyone has any recent experience with this stage?

- This all boils down to... any real chance of visa in hand by January 2026? Based on the original timeline we were planning for my mom to come in January on her tourist visa and stay for like 5 months and then go back and do the embassy phase in Bucharest, so this sudden early approval kind of busts our plans

- anyone traveled to the US successfully on a tourist visa while having an approved I-130 petition? Everywhere I looked strongly advises against this, and we obviously are leaning towards just waiting until she has her immigrant visa but curious to see others' experience

- and lastly.... what is going on at USCIS? Is this because of the government shutdown?

Hi everyone.

I am preparing the I-485 form for my husband. He served in the military in 2003, like every other men who performed mandatory military service. It lasted 5 months. All he did was clean up, build and holler stuff around, and learned how to shoot a few times. You know, the typical military service in the post soviet countries, waste of time. Nevertheless, we have a copy of his Military Card, translated. Please, help me respond to the following questions:

43a. Received any wapons training, paramilitary training or other military-type training? We chose YES.

The rest of the questions: NO.

49. Have you ever been a member of, assisted or participated in any group, unit, or org of any kind in which you or other persons used any type of weapons against any person or threatened to do so? We answered NO, because he never had to use those weapons, apart from the very few classes of shooting that he got. It was during peace time.

50. Have you ever served in, been a member of, etc, etc participated in any military or police unit? We answered YES because he was in the Army in 2003?

51. Have you served in any armed group that carries weapons, for ex. paramilitary unit, self defense or vigilante, rebel, guerilla... Does this apply to simple military service? This question sounds scary. Should we say YES here?

Thank you so much!

Hi everyone,

I am sure this question has been answered a lot of times here, but I can't find it on the website, thus forgive me if it is repetitive.

I am finding conflicting information everywhere. For 2024 my husband (beneficiary) and I (petitioner/sponsor) have filled our taxes jointly.

Part 6.7. My current individual annual income: I listed an estimate of how much I expect to make individually, without my spouse, in 2025.

Part 6.16a: Most recent tax year 2024: do I list our joint total income like it appears on our tax return, or do I substract my income from the joint and list only my individual income, based on my w2s?

I found information that I shouldn't list any income for the other two tax years (2023,2022), if I didn't make enough money, just write N/A. For example in 2023 I worked in Eastern Europe and made Eastern European salary, about 3000 USD. Do I list that income or write N/A?

Household info: My husband (beneficiary) is divorced and has two minor children, who live with his ex wife abroad. Do I list them to my household? Does the joint sponsor list them too? They don't intend to immigrate here.

Thanks a lot again!!!

Hello everyone,

Not sure if this is the right sub to post this question. Please feel free to move this thread elsewhere if needed.

My husband is in the US through U4U. My best friend sponsored him to come here, as I was in Europe at that time, ( we lived together with my family for two years) and didn't qualify to be a sponsor.

We got married here, and are working (slowly) on preparing the paperwork for the adjustment of status case. I only made 23,945 in 2024 ( started working in the US in April 2024), and my current job is cutting my hours dramatically, therefore my friend will be a joint sponsor. The problem is that the joint sponsor didn't finish filling his taxes for 2024. His accountant is still working on them. My 2022-2023 taxes are also still being processed at H&R Block, and I can't get transcripts of them, but I figured it wasn't a big deal since we have a joint sponsor, and I barely made any income in that timeframe.

Now, time is pressing and I don't feel comfortable waiting any longer. Would really like to get this process going. Would it hurt us if we submitted our case without the joint sponsor's 2024 taxes? He does have paystubs. Or should we wait and finalize all of our taxes first?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Hi guys,

Has any of you filed for an extension of the case? (I-129F petition)

We had to due to financial unexpected problems and even though consulates generally revalidate the petition after its due date, my consulate is making it difficult and we risk losing everything.

Psa: we scheduled the interview now and our medical has been completed too. The reason was I lost my job and was not guaranteed a job by the time our case expires August 16th 2024, our interview is September 17th 2024. We tried to book earlier but my fianc e would not be in possession of financial documents and we were worried about being denied because of it. (We also had to wait because I don t know anyone who would co sponsor) Do you think we will be alright?