Pete

My wife and I had our AOS (I-129F) interview in downtown San Francisco yesterday. We filed the I-485 back in early Jan and had one RFE which I immediately sent.

The interview was at 8 AM. A suited gentleman approached us in the waiting room at about 8:05, asked if we were Mr & Mrs so and so and escorted us back to his office (very classy gesture, no soulless screech on the loudspeaker to "go to door G"). My wife accidentally dropped an attache case as she got up and he immediately bent down to retrieve it for her, again a very nice gesture.

We were sworn in, made friendly small talk as he perused our file. He asked my wife and me if we had been married before (no), had kids (no), were ever arrested (no), planned terrorism (...no). He made some red marks in our file. Asked to see my wifes passport, and removed the I-94. He gave her a document to sign, which she did.

He thanked us for being on time for our appointment, advised we were through, would be receiving a welcome letter in a few days and a green card in less than 4 weeks. 10 minutes after we walked in, we walked out. Not one piece of evidence was asked for, or shown (but believe me, we came prepared).

The interviewer could not have been nicer, more polite, and professional if he tried. If this were a restaurant review (hey, it is San Francisco , I would give "5 Stars" to rate the whole experience.

For any of you out there agonizing over the interview, I would say it is possible for things go smooth as silk. I wish all of you the best in your journey, and my positive thoughts go out to those bogged down.

Hi All,

Any feedback as to not having joint bank accounts being a problem at the AOS interview?

We have joint home lease, joint health insurance, joint utility bill, tons of photo's. But have chosen to not add her to my personal bank accounts.

What has been your experience at the interview of what evidence is most heavily weighted?

Cheers,

Pete

If your fiancee is 21 or under prepare for a pain in the ###. She MUST have a notarized permisison from both parents and also from herself. We wound up having it done at a lawyers. (BTW- we were K-1)

If you do not have this, you WILL NOT receive your CFO stamp.

I have heard sometime fiancees's under 25 may need this. Best to call CFO ahead of time and be SURE.

If you have a young bride and wait until the day before your flight, you are in big trouble. Best to act VERY early in the game. We did and are thankful we did.

Who else is considering attending their fiancee's interview at the embassy? I would really like to be there, and then to accompany her on the trip back.

My only concern is: how to time the flight to her visa being delivered. The timelines are no less than 5 working days for delivery (assuming no complications).

Our interview is Wednesday Nov 15th, so I am thinking flight leaving Manila on Thursday Nov 23rd, which is Thanksgiving Day (ugh).

Any ideas on logistics of all this?

Elizabeth, will you please fill out your timeline?

Ok, here is the dealio. I called the Manila embassy just now and gave my case number 2006712XXX and asked if they could give me an interview date. She gave me the standard reply of 90-180 days, and then advised November will probably be the likely month.

My fiancee and I were in the first batch of post-IMBRA approvals (an NOA2 of 7/25). So, yes it appears I got my hopes up by looking at the wrong dates on the embassy website.

In any event, I will be thrilled with an (early! hehe) November date (but not ecstatic). Looking at the VJ stats, lots of poor folks last year had hellish long waits for an appointment, the good news is latest interview dates seem to show Manila working off the backlog.

All you folks in our date range - this is your latest news update.

Woo-hoo

This appears to be wonderful news, if you check the "Next available appointment date" on the Manila embassy web site it has in the past week moved from Oct 23, to Oct 5?

Unless someone knows something I don't, it looks like they are plowing thorough their backlog? And those of us Post-IMBRA will get an appointment approx only 60-75 days after NOA2?

Bueller? Bueller?

Thought many of you might be interested to read this. Filipinaheart.com is a hugely popular site owned by Australians (who also own many other dating internet sites). This is their response to me:

"Dear Member,

Thank you for contacting us and congratulations!

We are exempt from the IMBRA law under the provisions of section 4 ( b ) (ii), however we are in the process of implementing an information form so that those US members who are seeking marriage may complete the required information. It is our understanding that it may be beneficial to the Spouse Visa Application if US men complete the information specified in the IMBRA regulations.

However, we need to inform you that the law commenced March 6, therefore it will be applicable if you and your fiancee met after 6 March. If you met prior to this date the law will not be applicable therefore you will not be required to complete the form.

We would love to hear your success story and share it with all our other members.

If you would like to submit your success story, please do so by email to team@FilipinaHeart.com or by submitting it on the site. There is a link to add your success story on the home page of our site.

We wish you every happiness in the future and thank you for your valued membership at our site.

Please contact us if you require any further assistance.

Regards

team@FilipinaHeart.com"

Entire previous Artegal post...ummm masarap! (delicious)

Very nice post. Thank you.

But I know bad legislation when I see it. Just because there is a problem it doesn't mean every law that addresses it is a good law, and a person who opposes a law is not necessarily for the crime, understand?

Sums up the reality pretty good- thank you for saving me the typing.

Like the premise of "The Colbert Report", people want to "feel" a law is good, regardless of the weight (in this case the lack thereof) of the evidence proving otherwise. It is all puppies and butterflies as long as the law "sounds" good.

To cite emotionally gripping examples, and claiming they were all preventable if IMBRA had only been in effect, is intellectually bankrupt and only panders to the sensationalistic hot-buttons of the masses.

BUT what is always missing are the studies showing causation and linkage.

What studies were conducted? Were meta-studies done? Who were the control groups? What are the facts supporting this "power imbalance" theory? This is IMBRA's whole problem, it is all based on emotion, there are no facts supporting the alleged efficacy of the solution.

Don't cram legislation down my throat that was written in ambiguous and convolution fashion, based on knee-jerk reaction.

There were already laws in place for visa fraud, spousal abuse. Don't create new laws when you don't enforce the ones already in place.

The online version of the SF Chron is doing nice, original work covering the immigration issue. Feel free to write the author with your personal story. While quite sympathetic to the whole USCIS/DHS fiasco, she is not fully aware of the additional damage IMBRA has done to the already broken system.

E-mail Tyche Hendricks at thendricks@sfchronicle.com

This is the link to the story.

Ordeal of entering U.S. legally

No plan in Congress will solve the complexities, experts say

- Tyche Hendricks, Chronicle Staff Writer

"When Alfonso Farfán fell in love with an old family friend in 2002, he set out to bring his sweetheart and her two children home with him.

But nothing has gone as planned. After waiting a year for a fiancee visa for her to move here from El Salvador, he learned the paperwork had been lost.

The new application was delayed two years because U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services kept using an old address for Farfán, married now to Elizabeth Farfán, although he had twice updated their records. And when the family's green cards arrived six weeks ago, one was missing.

"I wanted to scream," said Farfán a paralegal at an Oakland immigrant assistance center, recalling the day he learned the immigration agency had lost the $1,500 application. "But you can't,'' he said. "You just have to work harder, save more money and submit a new application."

Legally immigrating to this country can be a gut-wrenching, yearslong ordeal. Administrative errors, protracted security checks -- which have lengthened markedly since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks -- and bad information routinely cause heartache. Immigrants and immigration lawyers say applications sometimes go into a "black hole" from which no case updates emanate.

"What's going on in Congress right now is still an add-on to an essentially outdated and overly complex, throwback system ... written in the 1950s and amended in 1965," said former immigration agency chief Doris Meissner, who is now senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, D.C. "The statutes are just hopelessly complicated and convoluted. ... It surely shouldn't have to be such an unpleasant and harrowing experience."

No plan under consideration will fundamentally overhaul the country's cobbled-together immigration law, which lawyers say rivals only the tax code in complexity.

Many legal immigrants have worried that immigration reforms proposed in Congress will allow some of the country's estimated 12 million illegal immigrants to skip this nerve-wracking process. But the bill the Senate passed last month could actually help the 3 million people currently in line for lawful permanent residence documents, or "green cards," to get them more easily. And those familiar with the bill say no illegal immigrant will get to cut into the line for a green card.

In addition to allowing several million undocumented immigrants to apply for temporary work visas and eventually permanent residence, the bill would make more green cards available overall.

But the proposal faces a tough battle in a forthcoming conference committee that will attempt to reconcile it with the immigration bill passed by the House in December. The House bill would criminalize illegal immigration and beef up immigration enforcement but makes no provision for new green cards.

Immigration advocates hope the additional green cards will, if the Senate bill becomes law, ease backlogs. The bill also could help the immigration agency improve its services because it will receive the new fines to be paid by undocumented immigrants adjusting to legal status. But it is not likely to address security bottlenecks or the lack of an integrated immigration computer system.

"It would be nice for them to get into the 20th century, let alone the 21st," said Crystal Williams, deputy director of the American Immigration Lawyers Association in Washington, D.C. "Everything is done by paper right now. We have the problem of paper being shifted back and forth around the country. Virtually nothing is done electronically."

The National Foundation for American Policy in Washington, D.C., reported last month that skilled workers must now wait more than five years for a green card and, in spite of recent progress, the backlogs are as long as they always have been for some categories of family-sponsored visas.

Filipino siblings of U.S. citizens still can expect to wait 22 years to immigrate. Adult children of U.S. citizens in Mexico will wait 13 years. And then there are the indignities:

-- Visitors to San Francisco's immigration office must pay nearby deli and copy shop workers $5 to hold their cell phones because they are forbidden in the building.

-- People seeking visas from abroad must pay $18 each time they schedule an appointment or check on their case.

-- People renewing temporary skilled-worker visas must return to their home countries, sometimes at a cost of thousands of dollars in airfare, to obtain the visa stamp in their passports that allows them to travel.

"It really is Kafkaesque," said Susan Bowyer, managing attorney at the International Institute of the East Bay. "All the power is in the immigration service's hands, because the burden is on the applicant to show by clear and convincing evidence that they're eligible."

Bowyer recalled the case of a Tongan woman who won the "diversity lottery," a program to admit 50,000 people a year from countries that don't produce many immigrants to the United States. She had to forgo her spot because she couldn't prove she had completed high school after the small religious institution folded.

A Salvadoran woman who petitioned in 1992 to bring her brother and his family from El Salvador saw the case summarily closed after a 12-year wait, Bowyer said, because a government clerk thought a note on a document saying the man was already here on a visit meant the family no longer wanted to immigrate.

Williams, of the immigration lawyers association, estimated that major errors like this occur in up to 10 percent of cases. Occasionally, the errors affect large numbers of people, she said. immigration agency recently rescinded 10,000 fiancee visas after realizing it hadn't asked about the citizen petitioners' criminal histories.

Simple matters, like getting the immigration service to keep track of a changed address, fail more often, said San Francisco attorney Angela Moore, chair of the Northern California chapter of the immigration lawyers group. When mail is returned to the agency, applicants can miss hearings or have their green cards destroyed, which means paying $260 for a replacement.

"I would guess it's at least 20 to 30 percent of the time," said Moore. "It's not infrequent at all."

Strict formulas that limit the number of immigrants from any one country and the order of preference by which relatives can apply for reunification can cause decadeslong delays. That and the lack of green cards or even temporary visas for low-skilled immigrants promote illegal migration, said Traci Hong, director of immigration programs, Asian American Justice Center in Washington,

D.C.

But the Senate's plan to offer permanent residence to millions of undocumented immigrants strikes a raw nerve with many people who came here legally.

"Part of my frustration is to hear illegal immigrants called immigrants when I'm called an alien. I'm doing things right, but I'm still called an alien," said French-born Florence Ahlouche, who has spent nine years in the United States. "If I lose my job tomorrow, my reward is a ticket back home."

First an au pair, then a student and now working on an H1B visa as a contracts administrator for a Foster City biotech company, Ahlouche longs to put down roots here in the country where she came of age. She began the green card application two years ago and expects to wait two or three more years, but she's concerned that a legalization program would let the undocumented jump ahead of her in line.

Others see a glimmer of hope in offering legal status to illegal immigrants. Kondala Rao Palaka, an Indian citizen who has lived in the United States for 16 years as a student and then an H1B worker, just got his green card last month, after a four-year wait. But his wife is still waiting for hers.

"These are hardworking people, just looking for a better life," said Palaka, a Fremont resident. "And because of their efforts, their demonstrations and lobbying, if Congress decides to allow them into the line, that will help people who are already waiting. It will mean they have to keep the line moving."

Immigration experts say that's precisely what would happen if the Senate bill becomes law. The increase in green cards is expected to eliminate all backlogs within six years, and everyone who has a pending application would be taken care of before any undocumented immigrant gets a green card.

But some immigration observers say making life easier for would-be immigrants should not be the government's first priority. Yeh Ling Ling, director of the Oakland-based Diversity Alliance for a Sustainable America and herself an immigrant from Vietnam, believes the United States lacks the resources to absorb more immigrants. She opposes the Senate bill, both for its expansion of legal immigration and for its offer of legal residence to illegal immigrants.

"If the Senate amnesty bill becomes law, we can expect 12 million illegal aliens to apply and, once naturalized, they can bring in their family members, spouses and children," said Yeh. "You cannot invite people to your house for dinner if some of your kids are starving."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Immigrating legally

About 1.1 million people gained lawful permanent residence in the United States -- green cards -- in fiscal year 2005, up from just under 1 million in 2004 and 700,000 in 2003. Strict formulas limit the number of immigrants from any one country.

The increase came in part from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services reducing a backlog -- now down to 3 million cases -- that developed in part after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

There are four main paths to a green card:

Sponsorship by a citizen or permanent resident who is a close relative (58 percent of green cards last year). Priority goes to the family of citizens. Relatives from some countries must wait decades.

Sponsorship by an employer, primarily for highly trained professionals lacking in the United States (22 percent of green cards last year).

A year of refugee or asylum status (about 13 percent of green cards in 2005). Last year's 143,000 such green cards doubled the previous year's number and tripled 2003's, after a post-Sept. 11 reduction.

Through the diversity lottery for 50,000 immigrants a year from underrepresented countries.

How immigrants apply:

People can apply for green cards through U.S. embassies overseas or through immigration service offices here, if they're in the United States legally. Almost all employment-based petitions are made on behalf of workers already in the United States. Family members more often apply from abroad and are generally denied tourist visas while waiting on the assumption that they would stay without authorization.

Anyone who has had a green card for five years is eligible to apply for citizenship.

E-mail Tyche Hendricks at thendricks@sfchronicle.com. "

I think what "mail order bride" sites mean are those sites that market the foreign woman as a commodity that is being "sold" to the USC male. Obviously you will not find sites openly trafficking in humans (at least I hope not). But the websites do advertise their "products" this way.

BINGO! In IMBRA2005's own words- they passed a law which does nothing to protect women, but instead targets crappy marketing. This hits the nail on the head. Create laws which make us feel better, not which have no teeth and are not written to actually provide results. They for all intents and purposes legislated good taste in advertising!

Once again, the laudable intention to do good slams into the concrete wall of unintended consequences.

All of us on here know, for a fact, that the whole purpose of the fiancee visa process is to allow the various governments to ascertain if the relationship is real or sham. Law was already in place, and the mechanisms were working.

What part of this do you consider being treated like a criminal?

With the passage of IMBRA, K-1 applicants are now selectively singled out as presumptively guilty as abusers until declared and proven innocent by even more background checks.

Got a multiple name match? Welcome to AR.

That is being treated like a criminal in the name of social engineering.

The point of the thread however is that we are a drop in the bucket compared to the tsunami of illegal immigrants. To subject us to unending (and increasing) scrutiny, when viewed in the context of the big picture, must make a reasonable person shake their head in disbelief.

This article in today's SF Chron just rubs salt into the open wound caused by IMBRA and USCIS. All K1 applicants have been chosen for even more scrutiny thanks to the IMBRA "social engineeering" law. But ignored is the reality: millions of illegal aliens enjoying life together in the USA, no worries.

But us K-1 applicants are treated as criminals and second class citizens, and denied our loved ones.

It just ain't right.

Here is the link.

Ramiro and Marisol looked on proudly as their 3-year-old son, Alexis, took out his toolbox and pretended to fix a closet in their new San Jose home. He was imitating the flurry of work his parents had put into the one-bedroom condominium over the past two weekends, installing new linoleum and carpets from Home Depot, painting and repairing.

With a shy giggle, Marisol, 27, pointed out where she plans to put the sofa and the TV in the tiny living room while Ramiro, 32, talked about being able to grill carne asada on the tree-shaded balcony.

They joked about how rarely they see each other. Ramiro works six days a week in a sheet-metal factory and attends night school to get his high school diploma. Marisol goes to business classes in the mornings and works afternoons as an office assistant while Alexis attends preschool.

It was a typical new-homeowner scene with one exception: Ramiro and Marisol, who asked that their last name not be used, are undocumented immigrants from Mexico. They've been in the country for four years. Marisol entered on a tourist visa. Ramiro hid in a car.

Their immigration status did not prevent them from buying a home. It is legal for undocumented people to purchase property in the United States.

The problem has been borrowing the money to pay for it. Ramiro and Marisol have stable jobs, but many undocumented people have spotty or nonexistent credit histories. Often, they've worked off the books. That's two big strikes against getting a mortgage.

Another issue used to be an absolute deal breaker when undocumented people applied for home loans: Until recently, people had to have a Social Security number to qualify for a mortgage.

Now, a handful of banks, including some major institutions, have begun offering home-mortgage loans to people who don't have Social Security accounts. Instead, borrowers can use individual taxpayer identification numbers, or ITINs, which are used to file income tax returns. These lending programs also allow borrowers to use unconventional ways to demonstrate their creditworthiness.

The Internal Revenue Service issues taxpayer IDs to both resident and nonresident aliens so they can pay taxes. A significant number of the 8.6 million holders of individual taxpayer IDs are illegal immigrants, according to the Government Accounting Office.

Even as a heated debate swirls around the 12 million unauthorized immigrants in the United States, they are increasingly participating in the country's financial system, from paying taxes to opening bank accounts. And, for many undocumented people, just as for many citizens, the ultimate financial goal is to be a homeowner.

"For those families who have the American dream, but don't have access to documentation, the (the taxpayer ID mortgage) is a way for them to be able to buy a home, lay down roots and build wealth for their family for the future," said Janis Bowdler, housing policy analyst at the National Council of La Raza, a Hispanic civil-rights organization in Washington, D.C.

Opponents of illegal immigration deplore mortgages for undocumented people. Some say the banks making taxpayer ID loans are guilty of aiding and abetting criminals.

U.S. Rep. John Doolittle, a Republican from Roseville (Placer County), has introduced a bill that would ban issuing residential mortgages to illegal immigrants.

"The government should not be in the business of creating incentives to encourage illegal behavior. Nor should companies be permitted to reward those individuals in clear violation of our laws," Doolittle said in a statement when he introduced the bill in October.

The bill, which also would require expedited deportation of people caught entering the United States illegally, is pending in the Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims.

It benefits the economy when immigrants move from "mattress money" into mainstream financial transactions, economists say. And illegal immigrants represent a huge potential market. Undocumented Latino immigrants could take out some $44 billion in mortgage loans if they had the same access as legal residents, according to a 2004 study for the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals.

"People traditionally talk about the undocumented Latino population as furtive people in the shadows who are very marginalized," said the study's author, Rob Paral, a research fellow with the American Immigration Law Foundation in Washington, D.C. "What's really changed is that a lot of people who are undocumented have fairly decent incomes. They have spending patterns and social behaviors which include an interest in buying a home and an ability to do it."

Using Census data on income and age, he estimated that 216,000 currently undocumented households could buy homes -- admittedly ones at modest prices. About a quarter of those potential home buyers are in California. "This is a large, untapped population from a financial point of view," Paral said. "If it were not restrained, it could be pouring a lot more money into society."

Banks have gotten that message loud and clear. U.S. banks now routinely accept both taxpayer ID numbers and a Mexican ID called matricula consular to open new accounts. Many reach out to the Latino community with Spanish marketing materials and bilingual bank tellers.

The latest twist is the taxpayer ID mortgage. Pioneered by small community banks, mainly in the Midwest, the loans slowly have begun to spread. As of September 2004, one credit union and 18 banks were offering such mortgages, according to a report by independent researcher Mari Gallagher. In California, Wells Fargo and Citibank both offer taxpayer ID mortgage loans, albeit in small programs.

Citibank's version of the loans is made in conjunction with ACORN Housing, a nonprofit that promotes home ownership among low-income people. ACORN does initial screening of potential borrowers and refers those who can qualify to Citibank.

Mark Rodgers, a spokesman for the New York bank, said its loans do not specifically address immigration status.

"We look to provide financial services across the wide spectrum of consumers in the United States," he said. "This is a program for borrowers in low- to moderate-income households, and we do, as part of that program, accept (taxpayer IDs) in addition to Social Security numbers."

Marisol and Ramiro got their mortgage through the Citibank/ACORN Housing program, which offers interest rates a full percentage point below the published rate and $3,000 toward closing costs or down payment. In addition, their Realtor, Rebecca Gallardo-Serrano of Protelo Group Realty in San Jose, gave them a rebate of $2,500 to help pay their closing costs. At less than $260,000, their small condo was the lowest-cost listing in Santa Clara County.

The program acknowledges the reality that many Latino immigrants do not have much traditional credit history.

"In the Latino community, we don't like to have debt," said Frances Martinez Myers, chairwoman of the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals. "We transact in cash, so there's no credit history."

Marisol and Ramirez, for example, "used very nonconventional credit," Gallardo-Serrano said. ACORN Housing verified that the couple had paid their bills on time for the past two years to PG&E, San Jose Water, their landlord and a health club. In addition, they showed two years of tax returns and employment history.

Lez Trujillo, field director with ACORN Housing Corp. in Chicago, said the program with Citibank, which is available in about seven states, has made 804 mortgages worth $153 million since early 2005. Of those, 387 were in California, primarily Northern California. An additional 1,300 borrowers are now in the pipeline, either in contract or shopping for a house.

None of the mortgages has resulted in a foreclosure. In fact, among all the borrowers, there have only been two late payments, both quickly remedied, she said.

Aren't illegal immigrants worried that buying a home could make them more vulnerable to deportation?

"It's a risk people are willing to take," Trujillo said. "Many of them have established credit, have had a job for many, many years, have been paying taxes. They have families, they want a stable place, privacy -- the same reasons the rest of society buys a house. The mentality is that they are here to stay and want to buy houses."

Wells Fargo has offered taxpayer ID mortgages since December in a pilot program in Los Angeles and Orange counties. The bank declined to discuss the program, instead sending a short statement saying it will continue to evaluate it.

The biggest barrier to such loans is that they cannot easily be sold on the secondary mortgage market. Most banks sell the mortgages they originate to bring in more money to make more loans. Instead, banks must keep taxpayer-ID mortgages in their portfolios, tying up capital.

"If there was an investor, whether Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae or someone on Wall Street, who decided they would start buying (taxpayer ID mortgages), it would certainly make it a lot easier for lenders to make them," said Brad German, a spokesman for Freddie Mac, a government-sponsored entity that repackages mortgages for sale to investors. Freddie Mac is studying whether to buy taxpayer ID mortgages, German said.

Mortgage Guarantee Insurance Corp., the nation's largest mortgage insurer, provides insurance on taxpayer ID loans.

While Mortgage Guarantee does not release specific numbers, Katie Monfre, a spokeswoman for the Milwaukee company, said taxpayer ID loans account for less than a half-percent of its overall business. "I can tell you the loans we've had on this very young book of business have been performing well," she said. That means they've had a very low rate of delinquencies and defaults.

Gallagher, who specializes in research on undocumented Mexicans and the mortgage market, said that despite the shifting political winds, she thinks taxpayer ID mortgages will grow because the market pressure of so many immigrants who want to buy homes will be so strong.

"This is the match that could light the next fire in the mortgage industry," she said.

That kind of talk ignites wrath among anti-immigration partisans.

"It's simply wrong for foreign lawbreakers to be enabled to plant roots in this country by way of obtaining a mortgage," Roy Beck, executive director of NumbersUSA, a group that wants to curtail immigration growth, wrote in support of the Doolittle bill that would bar mortgages for undocumented aliens.

Ramiro and Marisol don't see themselves as lawbreakers. They hope to become citizens. And they hope that their condo will appreciate in value so they can trade up.

"After I finish school, I want to have another baby, a girl," Marisol said. "Then in three years or maybe two, we can buy a house."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

E-mail Carolyn Said at csaid@sfchronicle.com.

Immigrants and finances

Immigrants participate less in

mainstream financial institutions than native-born Americans and have a lower

rate of home ownership. Immigrants in this study were a representative sample

of the country, so about two thirds are legal residents and one third are

undocumented.

Checking Savings Own Own

Household account account home stock

Immigrants 63% 55% 55% 13%

Native-born Americans 76% 68% 75% 27%

Source: Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago

Page A - 1

URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file...MNGRMJEGM81.DTL

Just emailed to Jim Witt, Senior VP, Executive Editor: jwitt@star-telegram.com

"Dear Mr. Witt,

I am writing to voice my disgust with the headline on the article at this link: http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/nation/14814686.htm

"Mail-order brides on hold waiting for new forms"

As a USA petitioner of a woman from another country, I can assure you the term "Mail Order Bride" is as derogatory and insulting as any racial epithet. Your headline adds insult to the injury already inflicted by USCIS and DHS inability to manage and execute the fiance visa process. Petitioners are put through a convoluted, emotionally wrenching process lasting 9 months-2 years.

Couples applying for fiancee visas expend thousands of dollars in application fees, travel expenses, and penalties for canceled plans as the visa application grinds its way through a broken system.

Did you know a good percentage of petitioners are women? Yes, their bride in another country is a man. Your headline further insults them!

For your publication to classify our "brides" as "Mail-Order" plays into old stereotypes perpetuated by people who have no idea what the truth is. A "Mail Order Bride" does not exist. Your editorial department owes visa applicants an apology for your insensitive headline."

While I am not nearly as well spoken as some of you, I think I made my point. I urge all of you to respond to Mr. Witt and explain the damage being done.

So, it seem we will be getting RFE's and new forms to deal with this IMBRA fiasco. That is the good news for today, but let's think to tomorrow.

Here is where I am afraid it turns into a real living nightmare...

IMBRA law says you have to check the box acknowledging you met through an "International Marriage Broker" even if you met on a dating website. Yup- check it out. If you messaged your fiancee online, the website that facilitated your contact was supposed to have given your disclosures to your fiancee. BEFORE you contacted them! If not- THEY WERE NOT IN COMPLIANCE WITH IMBRA.

Did you meet on Cherry Blossom? FilipinaHeart? Any of several hundred websites? Beacuse of the way they wrote IMBRA, you then have to check the IMB meeting box on the new I-129F.

But here is the rub: No dating websites were (and many still are not) compliant with the disclosures that IMBRA now onerously imposes! So... if you are honest and check the box on the I-129 that you met (by IMBRA's definition) though an IMB, then the consulate officer must ask the beneficiary if they were informed by the IMB of the petioners disclosures.

And of course.. the petitioner, if they are honest must say "no- I was not given disclosures".

And then the interviewing consulate officer must deny your visa!

Anybody else see yet another ocean of heartache here thanks to this IMBRA law that was rammed through with no thought to its practical implementation?

I cannot find any discussion of how this will be dealt with, and certainly no comment from USCIS. And of course now that the IMBRA supporters have got their special interest legislation passed, the last thing they care about is cleaning up this god forsaken mess they have created for 10,000 innocent people.

Am I the only person to wonder about this? How many of you met on any website? If you did, you are affected. I expect the pro-IMBRA crowd to shout me down about this, but watch and see the inbroglio that ensues as this legislation gains full impact against tens of thousands of innocent people.

Will you be found "Guilty of meeting by internet"?

I don't think that is true, otherwise this law would never have passed. I mean sure there are nuts everywhere but if this can prevent even one of them from abusing a woman then it works.

cristy- that may be one of the dumbest things I have ever read here. Did you ever stop to think not everybody lives a friendly, civilized country like Canada? And who says because something becomes law it is automatically a given that it is a good law? Are you really that naive? Most of the US tax code is written by lobbyists (like IMBRA2005) and special interest groups, and like IMBRA, it sure as hell doesn't serve the public interest.

Take a moment if you can and imagine beneficiaries who live in countries that are not so nice (unlike Canada). Even our friendly IMBRA lobbyist/sponsor admitted

Unlike their American counterparts, these women frequently come from countries where the police are not to be trusted, where domestic violence isn't even a crime, etc.

There is no disputing the fact that the VAST majority of American sponsors will be kind loving spouses and not abusers. So to extend that FACT, and extend IMBRA2005's quote...

The backers of the IMBRA legislation have just placed my fiancee in harms way by indefinitely delaying her arrival into the USA and my safe arms.

The IMBRA backers have placed a HUGE number of women in harms way by this fact. This is the elephant in the room that nobody has bothered to recognise. Cristy, by virtue of your IMBRA support, you are placing FAR more women in harms way. Can you see that? You and IMBRA2005 are hanging yourselves from your own petard, how does it feel to know the damage you are doing?

Here is the bottom line- IMBRA will keep more women in abusive situations than it will ever prevent. The IMBRA backers (knowingly) placed additional burden on a government office that was already mismanaged to the point of negligence. Now innocent women in these exact countries where they have the fewest rights and safeguards are condemned to more potential abuse.

The law was ostensibly passed to keep beneficiaries out of abusive relationships, but in fact the opposite is true. It lengthens the time they are in potentially abusive situations.

So let's tally this up, IMBRA in reality equals:

1. Women left in desperate situations in other countries as IMBRA implementation drags on, and on, and on.

2. One more way for a fiancee visa process to be derailed by authorities who already have difficulty interpreting existing laws. IMBRA is written in such convoluted fashion that it is inevitable many petitioners will receive visa denials on technicalities that have no bearing on their loving relationship.

3. Loved ones kept apart for no good reason.

4. Petitioners subject to extraordinary expenses due to dragged-out approvals, canceled tickets and lodging, additional communication costs...

5. A blatant denial of my basic human right to freely court and marry the spouse of my choice. The constitution is clear in my right to pursue happiness. This law is an inarguable violation of that constitutional right.

I love my fiance more than life itself- but because of IMBRA she is now placed in extended jeopardy, and I have no idea when, if ever, the broken fiancee visa machinery will allow us to be together. That is why this an emotionally charged topic for me.

I have to comfort her when she is sobbing in despair as I try to explain why we can't be together. And the explanation is that I first have to be investigated for the crime of meeting her on Instant Messenger on a web site, and for proof that I really am innocent of any crimes.

Yeah- you really are helping innocent women...

Enjoy!

Zethris, Pete...sorry for the mix-up

I should at least check and see just who is in my Kool-Aid before I unleash the Kool-Aid man

Everyone say it with me...

OH YEAH!

Hehe... No worries, I was chuckling at your post as I was responding back. I love your passion, your future spouse is lucky and in for a challenge OH YEAH!

Back on the IMBRA topic...

Just think, tens of millions of illegals in this country never had to go through what we all are being forced to, simply because we chose to play by the rules. And we are the ones suffering. Tens of millions more in the future too friends, because the flow won't be stopped. How does IMBRA affect them? It doesn't. It just hurts the people that try to do right.

Thanks to the monsters that created the cruel, poorly written law that is IMBRA combined with USCIS having no accountability to anyone, and seemingly no ability to serve the public... well it sucks to be in love with a person not from the USA. Family values my azz.

Readers of this thread - If you have not contacted your Congressperson or Senator, you must do so today. Tell them this abuse of applicants and lack of accountability by USCIS is not acceptable.

Sheep to the back of the visa line.

With all due respect, zethris: you are now all up in MY Kool-Aid, and you don't even know the flavor.

Your suggestion that those who elect not to pursue your favored course of action on their own cases should have their applications penalized is your own opinion, to which you are entitled. Airing it, however, has earned you 90 Rude Points, out of a possible 100.

Bottom line: you're not the boss of me. Adjust your attitude accordingly.

A ticked-off Tigre

Er, that was me, not zethris, that wrote your quoted statement

I apologize for my poor wording, as you would be the last person I would lump in as a watcher and not a do-er You HAVE taken action and are definitely helping the cause!

My intent was that people need to raise awareness of the USCIS processing fiasco in addition to posting on the this forum. Aside from USCIS customer (dis)service, I think making a lot of noise is a good thing. It is probably good too that the ruckus come from all directions (senators, congresspeople, Ombudsfolk, lawyers, and other branches of government).

Did you read about the guy that got ate by the lioness? LINK Hehe, looks you are mauling us... Tigre on the loose!

Hey- Happy Monday and cheers to all who are fighting the good fight regardless of their chosen avenue

And one more thing:

Some posters have commented that USCIS processing is like applying for a job or mortgage.

WRONG!

I spent 5 years in the mortgage business: equity, retail and wholesale and I can guarantee you getting a mortgage is 10,000 times easier than the fiancee visa process. On a mortgage app they pull a credit report. THAT'S IT! There is NO background check! Not with the FBI, the CIA, the State Department and who knows how many other local and regional databases.

A job applicant MIGHT have a credit report pulled.

Criminal records? FBI check? IMBRA type disclosures??? PLEASE. You are delusional or severely mis-informed if you think the USCIS checks are remotely similar to applying for a mortgage or a job.

Please don't spread that kind of mis-information or try to reframe the real problem with those comparisons.

Bottom line: USCIS is charged with processing petitions in a timely manner. 90-120- who knows how many days is not a timely manner. This is a government agency, and as such is paid for by my tax dollars (and my application fees!).

Anybody remember "No taxation without representation"?? If memory serves, that particular issue led to some minor changes here in the USA :-)

There sure as hell is no applicant representation as far as USCIS goes. All there is, is stonewalling, obfuscation and hours hold time on the telephone for contract call center employees that know nothing.

They go home at night, every night, to their loved ones. I don't. And I have no idea when I will because of their lack of transparancy and inability to CARRY OUT THIER DUTY TO PROCESS APPLICATIONS.

Yes, I am not happy, yes I am willing to try to change the system for the better.

I have come to find out through this entire journey I have been on even before submiting the I-129F, that a good 2 - 3 months average wait time throughout the visa process is not because of volume, but because of the inefficient bureaucracy that is involved.

zethris you are sooo on target (and my new hero). If everyone on this forum chose to take action we could put some real pressure on those that can FIX the problems with USCIS management.

You hit the nail on the head- USCIS has proven to be as competent as FEMA was during the New Orleans hurricane! As we all know, USCIS and Dept of State insulate themselves from responsibility and the consequences of their poor management, and we suffer. There is no accountability! That is why the system is broken.

There is no excuse for a fiancee visa to take 9-12 months from application to issue. None.

The government always f's up whatever they touch, and as we continue to give up our freedoms (wiretapping, background checks, IMBRA) the worse it will get.

Class action law suit- bring it on! I want in!

Readers of this thread - If you have not contacted your Congressperson or Senator, you must do so today. Tell them this abuse of applicants and lack of accountability by USCIS is not acceptable.

Sheep to the back of the visa line.

This is what I just sent to Department of Homeland Security

Recently I filed a K-1 visa petition. Recently I have been reading where the I-129F application did not meet the requirements for the recently passed law International Marriage Brokers Regulation Act which requires that questions be asked as to the petitioner's criminal background as to things like domestic violence. I want to know since I filed my petition before the I-129F application required any questions as to the petitioner's criminal background can I expect additional papers in the mail to fill out and how many days, weeks, or months will this add to the process?

If anyone else wants to send your questions or comments to DHS this is the webpage.

http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/contactus

PS..........Catagory Immigration then click submit to send email

Nice find tjv2000 and great feedback! I love to see people finding and posting these links, and ACTING not just "hoping".

No idea where it goes but I just used that feedback form at the link above to send this:

"Dear Sir/Madam,

I filed a K1 I-129F application for fiancee' visa, which was received at USCIS CA on 3/29/2006.

I am now aware that the already agonizingly slow approval process has actually gone into reverse because USCIS was not compliant with the new IMBRA law.

Over 1000 approved applications have been returned to USCIS for additional processing!

Thousands of innocent people are now caught in the deepening black hole of the fiancee' visa approval process.

How has this been allowed to happen? Is anything being done to address the massive backlog of fiancee' visa processing? Can you place an emphasis on expediting existing fiancee visa applications since the processing delays are mentally devasting the people involved? Why does it take 5 months to get an interview at the Philippine embassy after approval?

Thank you for the courtesy of a reply. "

I challenge each and every person reading this forum to take action if you ever want to see an approval this year. Your silence means nothing will change for the better.

I wrote a letter to my congressman. His office is right down the street from my work and I will see him on Monday at our local parade.

Here is the letter I wrote to my congressman:

I was actually able to send this via email to him. I plan on speaking to him personally on Monday at the parade.

Bingo! Very nice and doesn't pull punches. Glad to see others taking action.

Mine was very similar: Asking for an explanation of the visa process going into reverse, asking for an immediate investigation of DHS and USCIS, and seeking all possible effort being brought to bear in processing applications and expediting of I-129F especially as they are keeping loved ones apart.

If every US citizen reading this forum contacted their Congresspeople and Senators, we might bring some accountability to this walled-off bastion of bureacracy called USCIS and DHS.

People can easily locate their representatives at this site: http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/

Unless we act together and enmasse, we will continue to languish in "wait land".