SaharaSunset

So I remember on my husband's fiance visa (where we used a lawyer) she put "n/a" on anything we didn't have information to fill in. But I looked at the sample I-751 from this website, and it just leaves a bunch of spaces blank. So are blank spaces okay then? The PDF form I have been filling out won't let me type "n/a" in those spaces, but I could go through and do it by hand. There's just lots of spaces (like all the ones for children) - and I don't want a ton of "n/a"'s to get confusing. But I also don't want more delays because of dumb technicalities. Thanks for any advice or experience!

No. No single piece of evidence will make/break a case. However, the more primary/strong evidence aka those with financial ties, the better.

You could include affidavits from friends, Costco memberships, the junk mail, etc but these are considered weak/secondary evidence. If I were you, I would include every statement from your joint bank accounts as far back as they go. Usually quarterly statements are recommended but I would provide more rather than less. I actually think your evidence is solid. Lots of people don't buy cars, houses together. Many people don't get credit cards together. But you want the strongest case possible to avoid the dreaded RFE - sure to waste your time and scare the heck out of you.

Are you including tax returns or tax transcripts? Transcripts (free from the IRS) are the ones you want. (Although I sent in my electronic tax fillings and it didn't seem to be a problem).

Okay thanks! I was just going to send copies of my electronic tax returns, but I can get the transcripts if thats better. I don't want that RFE so that why I have so many questions

Thanks guys!

So I have been browsing this forum gathering info, and I have noticed thats some people include their marriage license as evidence with their I-751. Is that required? In one comment someone mentioned that the USCIS official reviewing the removal of conditions will not have access to previous filings (like the stuff we sent for the AOS). So is including the marriage certificate, and maybe some marriage/honeymoon pictures something good or perhaps important to do? Thanks!

Yes, car and health insurance would be beneficial in light of not having the house, credit, or rent payments. No 1 piece of evidence makes/breaks things. I think you would be fine. In a cover letter note what you are lacking and why (like the letter from your folks). What more do you have that you are currently not producing? Good luck!

So rent & house stuff is the make or break evidence? Is the letter enough then? Of course I'm not sure what more we could show to prove residence beside junk mail. Well I guess we have like stuff from the dentist for my husband with our address on it. And we have stuff from the hospital for me with our address. And we have pay stubs from my husband sent to our address. But thats pretty much it as far as residence related stuff. What other kinds of things could I produce??

Okay so I like so many others, have some questions are regarding the evidence....because we don't have much, but based on what I have seen in lists of evidence, it seems like what we do have is quality stuff, but just not lots of different things.

So my husband and I have 3 years of joint tax returns, and have joint bank accounts since right after we got married (so since the end of 2011). But thats pretty much all we have for financial stuff. We have no other credit cards joint, no house, and the car loan is just in my name. We have been living with my parents, rent & utility free the whole time...so we have no rental agreements or utility bills. I plan to have my parents write a notarized letter explaining, but is that enough? My husband is also on my health insurance, and car insurance - so we can produce some info about that - but is that neccesary? Also, we have no kids yet. We do have some pics like at family weddings, and from a few vacations, but not much - because I hate pictures!

Thats about it for our official records/ what we plan to send as evidence:

- 2011-2013 joint tax returns

- 2 joint bank accounts (started in the end of 2011)

- Joint health Insurance

- Joint Car Insurance

- Letter explaining living with my parents

- 10 or so pictures of us together & with my family

- Drivers licenses showing same address

So my question is, will those things be enough? Or should I produce more? And if so, what??

Thanks for the help! And thoughts or ideas would be awesome!

Cheers!

I very well remembner morocco4ever from 2006, ~jacki~, Rajareda, hanginginthere, and many others whom are moisrtly mia from these boards since my journey began here. I do not use the screen name I did than because my inlaws from morocco were reading my posts and my intention is NOT to rip my X an new one or try to GET EVEN but to tell what happened to me. I knew before I decided to tell my personal story that I would get people talking and some would become defensive and others down right insulted. I chose to tell my story in any case. Why shouldn't I? It really happened. Its not a rumor or here say and I am not prejudice. I am muslim & Christian. I was on these boards everyday for more than a year. I know the boards. nearly everyone (NEARLY NOT EVERYONE) are now divorced already. Do the math. figure the percentage. Most don't even seem to want to tell their story it seems and they don't need to. Get past it and move on right???? I just think it is happening a lot more often than people think year after year. Not everyone comes to or posts on VJ. they suffer in silence. I am sure there are success stories and I am not against trying my luck again at some point should I gather the emotional energy lOL. But I will be a lot more careful.

I would definitely take a minimum of 2 years getting to know my partner and probably stay with them in their home country several times for a lengthy time and learn the language to know what they say around me to others (an possibly not let them know this) But don't you think that's a lot to have to do?????? Are the men in the USA really that awful?????? I mean seriously yes there are good and bad men everywhere but....are you willing to have a marriage that has so many potential things to go wrong? Just for a handful of years of struggle dealing with so many cultural differences? Ask yourself if that same guy were in the USA already...would he still be crazy about me? If he was working full time here in USA, could be with anyone he wanted, Has a cool ride, great job his own pad, would I be his flavor of the month???? or life partner forever? Just keep an open mind- consider everything- think outside the box

Okay, so I am a teacher, and I teach a course on World Religions. Sadly, I am constantly battling the ignorant stereotypes of my students about Islam. As I listen to my students make conclusions that all Muslims are terrorists, I have come to loathe stereotypes in all its forms. My student's conclusions are based on limited information - but to them, their feeling are very real and very valid. They base their stereotypes on what they have heard from others & what they have seen on TV. All they need to do is make connections between Islam and 9/11, and its nearly impossible to convince them otherwise. But they are wrong. And it is my passion as a teacher to broaden their horizons, and clear their minds of ignorance. I start by putting a stop to the sweeping, ignorant stereotypes.

So I apologize if it seems harsh Rosesarered, but I find your comments and stereotypes of Moroccans painfully ignorant. Yes I know you are not stereotyping Islam. But your attempt to stereotype all Moroccan men has a similar effect. You are perpetuating uneducated stereotypes about other cultures. And I do in fact find that, in and of itself, offensive and ignorant. Who are you to make authoritative statements about Moroccan men, just because you used poor judgement when you chose a husband?

It seems that you base your claims on your personal marriage. And yet we have no way of knowing the real reason your marriage ended. You might have been selfish, cold, or stubborn. Who knows? But we do know that you have absolved yourself of ANY responsibility by laying the claim that it was a scam, and that all Moroccan men are most likely scammers. You also make these ignorant claims based on your personal observations of the people who come to this website - As if that is some sort of conclusive study or set of statistics. And yet you have no idea what percentage of people involved in International Moroccan marriages actually come to this website. So your conclusions are totally skewed.

You might feel you are doing good to "warn others" about big bad Moroccan Scamming men. But its a shame you choose to "help others" by stereotyping other human beings, as opposed to, for example, taking personal responsibility for your choice. And although I really do respect the fact that you feel you are trying to help others. Stereotypes never accomplish anything beyond spreading ignorance and hate.

Morocco and Nigeria worst places to marry a foreigner and stay married.....sad but true....I dare say the majority are fake relationships but how to convince someone? I bet someone try to warn you and you probably dismissed them....I guess everyone wants to find out for themselves.....hope the journey is worth it.....bcoz the ending certainly doesn't. ....

Not sure what makes you an expert on the "worst places" to marry a foreigner...or where you get your statistics....? "Bcoz" it looks like you (or your spouse) is from Guyana, not Nigeria or Morocco.....and so I dare say I question your authority on the matter. But how to convince someone who is clearly prone to throw out sweeping generalizations & invented statistics? Ah the joys of anonymous internet forums. Where anyone can become an expert on anything, based on absolutely nothing. Sad but true.

Oooo...Its been a while since we've had a juicy topic like this...

Rosesarered, based on your conclusions about Moroccan men, you probably shouldn't trust this Moroccan man "friend" that's telling you to beware of Moroccan men. He's probably be doing the very same thing that all Moroccan men who "befriend" older American women are doing, he's just trying to snag a visa. my thoughts to you Rosesarered is to cut your losses and stop trusting ANY Moroccan man that would be "friends" with a non-virgin, over age 30, American woman -including your current Moroccan man friend who's so kindly warning you about Moroccan men.

So, we're getting close to filing for ROC for my husband and I have not yet changed my last name. I didn't do it at first because I was afraid (as my husband's sponsor) I'd have to file some more paperwork or something. But I think I've gathered from reading other posts that since I am USC, I wouldn't have to do anything. But, even knowing that, I still have not changed my last name.

Now we are a few months away from ROC, and frankly, part of why I don't want to change my name at this point is because its such a hassle to change all my cards and passport and certifications etc etc. But I'm also a tad nervous that somehow, in some unforeseen way, changing my name at this point will cause some obscure issue when we do file.

So, all of that being said, I have determined for now to leave my name as is. But, that makes me wonder if NOT changing my last name will be some sort of red flag? I think we have plenty of strong "financial" evidence and all that. So my question is, does any one have experience with having different last names when they file for ROC, and that alone being a cause for a refusal or delay or something negative?

Cheers!

3 hours is great and will give you enough time to go through customs etc. My husband flew from Casablanca to JFK with a 3 hour layover with no problems. He even had like an hour to spare. Don't go less that 3 though. But you do not need much more that 3 hours, maybe 4 hours tops. Get through customs and head straight to your gate and you should be fine. Good luck!

Its not MAY. All states HAVE to accept the I-751 receipt and extent your license by a year, as that letter basically means your Residency has been extended by a year. Just take that letter to your DMV and they should help you out.

Okay thank you. That makes sense. Regardless of the state, it seems weird that any state would leave people in limbo without another option. But I wish my state would have given my husband more than just 9 months

Thanks all for the replies!

So my husband has a conditional green card, and finally got his drivers license this week. But much to my surprise it expires in September - in 9 months! His drivers license expires the same day that his conditional green card expires. Is that right and normal? I mean I kind of get it...but then again I don't because its not like when your Conditional Card expires you are then illegally in the country. So what do they expect us to do? What if his 10 year card takes a year to get? Do they expect him to be in resident status limbo for all that time - and have an expired drivers license? It seems really dumb to me.

I guess I'm just wondering if this is a standard thing - or if we need to go chat with the Driver's license people? And if it is normal, then what, if anything, can we do about it?

Thanks!

Adding, I am actually a couple years older than my husband. (insert token phrase about gee, it's a good thing he's such an old soul and I'm not really all that grown up, and am lucky to look so much younger, etc etc)

Your "token phrase" is classic!

I rest my case OP. I do believe the name calling, the condescension, the immaturity, the irrational venom, the combative baiting and general lack respect with which you respond to others in your posts speaks for itself. I'd just like to leave you with a wise quote...

Cheers!

I agree with Sandinista....trying to reason with someone like the OP is folly. Her frequent mentions of her "attractiveness to western men", extensive education, and cultural savvy, are nothing more than a sad, and desperate attempt to set herself above us all, and give herself credibility and authority...a vain grasping attempt to conceal tragic insecurities that are glaringly obvious to everyone but her. "Methinks thou doth profess too much." She is desperate to validate her bad choice, by laying full blame on all MENA men. And anyone who has received one of her delightfully venomous replies, surely can sense that perhaps there is much more to this "tragic" tale, that just a scummy husband who went awol. At first it was the lowlife scammer "sometimes abuser" that left her to live and do business with some old man....then suddenly she was the confident champion who could have stayed with him, but chose to leave him. With each story change I am more confident that the we are not actually getting the real story at all.

I'm sure its enraging have her theory shattered. A theory which I'm sure at one time probably made her feel better, and less foolish. The theory is that "the majority" of MENA relationships are as dysfunctional as hers was. It must be awful to learn that in fact, it was actually your own poor choice that landed you a bad egg, and not be able to blame MENA men in general. Because as long as she came blame the lot of them, then she doesn't have to acknowledge that perhaps she was just foolish, and made a rotten choice for a husband. Misery loves company. And I'm sure our stories, and our wonderful, good MENA husbands & relationships must just irk her to the core....hence the defensive lashing out, and desperate attempts to belittle and discredit everyone who disagrees with her. I think the nature of the OP's replies (and original post to begin with) gives us more insight than anything to the truth behind the words ....if you catch my drift.

Thank you all!

So my husband is going to visit Morocco in 2 weeks, and his flight is direct to Paris, with a 2 hour layover at CGD airport, then on to Casablanca. I have been looking online for info about whether or not he needs a transit visa. The info I'm finding seems to point to No. I even read the France Consulate website, and if I'm understanding it right, I think he's okay.

He has a 2 year conditional Green Card (with just over a year left before we remove conditions). He's only staying for one month, and the ticket is round-trip. I have done this exact flight through Paris myself and for the life of me I can't remember if they make you go through customs, or exactly what happens. He's not planning to leave the airport obviously, he's gonna need to hustle to make his connection. So seems good to go.

But then of course, I read someone's response on a forum here, to a similar question (asked by someone from India), and they told some horror story about a friend passing through Paris and getting sent back to the US because they didn't have a transit visa, even though they just had a 2 hour layover. So now I'm second guessing myself. And now I'm also afraid he'll have trouble when he comes back, where once again he is connecting through Paris, then on to the U.S.

So I'm just wondering if anyone, or anyone's spouse, has gone through Paris on the way to Morocco, and can verify from personal experience that (with a Greencard) no transit visa is necessary? Thanks!

... if it is already happening, why are we wasting our time and resources fighting it, when it doesn't really affect the rest of us to begin with? Once those jobs that are open are swallowed up, they will stop coming. Simple as that.

The only thing that it does affect us in a way is the government assistance they get from our tax dollars, such as schooling, without paying into the system via taxation themselves. The simple solution then is to legalize them and tax them of course. And of course reform the welfare system so they don't become lenient on it and become a public cost, but that is a problem that should be dealt with anyways as many Americans exploit that as well.

The way I see it, we can either spend millions fighting something that is going to occur either way or we can allow it and work with it so it works to an advantage for us. Gating ourselves in will only lead to our decay in a world-connected economy.

Your logic is hilarious! "Why waste time on something that is already happening???" Well by your logic, we should throw out prisons too right? I mean bad people are gonna do bad things, so why waste time trying to catch them and lock them up. Eventually they'll just kill everyone and then kill eachother and then we'll be extinct. Simple as that. I mean why fight something that's already happening?

And I love how you throw in "And of course reform the welfare system" - HA!! How about we tackle that beast first before we open the door to millions who will tap into it the second they get the chance...that is if they haven't already through stolen social security numbers etc. You're living in a dream world if you think that the massive sums of money that are shelled out to people on the doll doesn't impact our economy. And the paltry tax revenue from people earning less than minimum wage will not compensate for the the money tax money spent covering their welfare check. Or maybe they'll figure out what so many Americans have - feign "disability" or unemployment and earn a much better, "free" paycheck than you could ever rake in working for minimum wage....then we'll get no tax revenue from them anyway, and we'll just get to pay for their new "legal" life here. Super fun. Oh and I consider the 30+ percent of my paycheck that goes to taxes(which of course also pays for welfare) a pretty significant impact on my economy....

I think the OP is right. Shut down the businesses who employ illegals. Brilliant. Problem solved. No need to spend millions deporting people, they'll go home on their own when suddenly they can;t find work. And then illegal immigration will stop. Simple as that. Then work on streamlining the processing of legal immigration.

And then, heaven forbid, those self-serving illegal employers might actually have to pay people a fair wage for their work. And spare me the line about "no one will do those jobs" I don't believe for one second that Americans are too lazy to "do the jobs no one else wants." Garbage men deal with trash all day long - who wants that job????!!! Oh, maybe someone who want to get paid $80,000 a year. Not to shabby. And you can't tell me that's a job anyone wants. Pay farm workers even just $15 an hour, and you'll have people fighting for that job....legal American citizens and residents are not to lazy to work when they are paid a fair a reasonable wage.

Please ignore my last post. I did misunderstand...I think

Chicago ! hahahahhahahhaaaa tis the summer, need more shootings.

Carry On!

What an absolutely callus and repulsively disgusting comment to make. Not funny or clever, or witty at all. You do remember Sandy Hook Elementary....20 little 6 year olds' shot in cold blood? Maybe I misunderstood what you meant, but I find your "need more shootings" comment/sense of humor inappropriate, base, and again, absolutely disgusting.

Amen! EXACTLY how I feel!!! Makes me FURIOUS!!!!!

Actually, I prefer actual conversation (unlike some), but tl;dr means "too long; didn't read", which is used when you post a wall of text rather than a concise thought (or thoughts). Since that's not your style, I'll indulge your walls of text preference.

Did I ever say that sucky teachers are the rule? No. Did I say the bad outweighs the good? No. But to ignore these things that do exist to some degree and not try to fix a problem is just not very progressive, now is it? You shouldn't accept problems when you can acknowledge them and propose solutions in anything. What good does that do? If you like unions, good for you to have that opinion. That doesn't mean everything is perfect, though.

Please think about doing some research about teachers being recycled in school districts before claiming they aren't (or aren't frequently - it's a national problem). It's called the "dance of the lemons" (wonderful video representation/explanation of it in the documentary I mentioned previously "Waiting for Superman" - a clip of it is probably on YouTube and the whole doc is on Netflix). Check out here to learn what's being done now in D.C. about it: http://www.washingtonpolicy.org/blog/post/sb-5242-would-end-dance-lemons-teachers’-placements

Unions, as a general rule, make it difficult for business managers (in this case, principals or administrators) to act independently of the union. If you support that, good for you, but to pretend as if principals can actually take action on their own and punish teachers is just not understanding how teachers unions, and unions in general, work. The article about the dance of the lemons even touches on that - and it's a very short article.

I wouldn't call my view (easily supported by the way unions are structured and operate) about principals naive or ignorant. If you're going to disagree, it'd be more apt to say I'm too cynical and pessimistic. That'd be a fair viewpoint to have. We could debate that if you then took the time to understand the problems of the school system in America (from teachers, to unions, to government funding, to testing, etc.). Heck, we could even debate the extent to which unions are the problem, or teachers are the problem, or any of the potential causes of the problems, but if you're not going to believe in the factual faults of the system in relation to all the causes, we can't really talk about solutions.

I enjoy a good debate, but for a debate to start we have to agree on what exactly we're debating. Otherwise neither of us will say anything effective.

Its true, its seems we are jumping around to different topics in education - but that's because while there are many layers of the "anti-union" debate, it always come down to the fury over teachers supposedly being un-fireable, because of Unions. So in effect, anti-union talk is really anti-"bad teacher" talk. (And believe it or not I HAVE researched this topic - A LOT - hence the "wall of text"). So now bringing it all back together, by stressing that "bad teachers" are the exception, I am pointing out that, 1st: I don't think the "problem" of education lies in the inability of principals to fire teachers. And that's because frankly I don't think the "problem" is 100% the teachers. Which is why in my previous comment I stated that I think the greater issue lies in what is happening to families, and home life.

But no one wants to talk about that as the issue, because what can be done? How can you force busy working parents to spend time lovingly reading to their children or encouraging them to do homework? I promise you, if parents actually did that, the literacy problems that education does have, would disappear, more kids would graduate, and test scores would soar. But we can't do that, so blame is shifted to teachers. And the conclusion is made that the issue is the result of "bad teachers" who can't be fired because of unions. I simply disagree.

That "excellent" documentary that you, and everyone keeps referencing, "Waiting for Superman," is shameless propaganda. The facts its shares are biased and inaccurate, but it excels and getting you riled up into thinking that school are "failing" their kids because so many kids aren't graduating and our test scores are supposedly lower compared to other countries. Yeah, it IS sad that so many kids drop out. But is that really because of the school? Or, as I stated before, is it what's happening at home?

I know, its easier and more concise to find someone else to blame. If "Waiting For Superman," chose to highlight the 90% of those flunking kids that DON'T have loving supportive parents, and DO have teachers that have tried desperately to reach them, (but can't because little johnny misses school to babysit, or worse to sell drugs for his uncle etc) well then it would be a very different documentary wouldn't it? I laugh at how it mentions that American kids have soaring confidence despite their failures....well who do you think is the source of that confidence? The teacher they see for one year, for a few hours a day? Or the parents who refuse to discipline, set rules, and teach their kids the value of hard work?

As I stated before, the flashy statistics they show about our ranking amongst other developed countries are skewed. I gave you the example of China who does not include the kids who literally cannot take the test, while American schools are FORCED to include those scores. How would that not cause us to rank lower? And if we want accurate statistics in comparing our School scores to international scores, then we need to level the playing field.

We need to look at the successful things that those countries are doing...NOT just blindly trying to catch up by adressing what buisnessmen, who know nothing about education, have decided must be the "problems." For example - the Science classes in Finland cap at 16 students. Our High Schools have an average of 30-35 students in a class period. So how would killing Unions solve the class size issue? And Teachers in Finland spend only 4 hours a day teaching - Our teachers are at 6-7 hours, and without Unions, our teachers would likely do 8-9 hours of teaching a day. (And if you think teaching 8-9 hours wouldn't affect a teacher ability to succeed with students, then try teaching for a few months.) Here is an article about Finlands Education System. http://www.businessinsider.com/finland-education-school-2011-12#

Oh And don't even get me started on Michelle Rhee (featured in Waiting for Superman). She is absolutely full of $#*!. Seriously. Do some real research on her and you'll learn that her statistics and programs are not really what she'd like America to believe they are/were.

Of course there are issues in our school system, there always have been and always will be, because no system is perfect. But the fear mongering about our education system being "broken" - I simply disagree. Partly because I live in a Unionzed school district that is successful - has an 87% graduation rate, and yet is part of this supposedly "broken" system...hmmmm. Nor do I think doing away with unions, and vilifying teachers will improve low test scores, or increase graduation rates. I think, rather than scrambling to lay blame on "bad teachers," and "evil unions" we need to look at what's really wrong in the system, and be willing to accept responsibility...just like we as parents cheerfully take credit for our child's successes...then likewise we need to take credit when it comes to failures.