Cryssiekins

Congratulations! It feels so awesome to finally have this journey completed.

My letter wasn’t visible until a day later. It will come by mail too. I HOPE your i751 will be scheduled at the same time. I didn’t get a case update for that on the website, just a letter, which came 3-4 days after the n400 letter.

https://egov.uscis.gov/e-request/Intro.do choose the outside normal processing. They usually estimate 1-2 weeks for an update, but at least it means someone will look into it. You’re likely to get a canned response, but it’s worth a shot.

Have you tried calling for an infopass for a stamp? When the person who put the stamp in my passport looked up my file, she was like “oh, yep, looks like it’s just sitting here” and it was a few days later that they scheduled me. No way Albany is that far behind. Open a service request online too (at least for the 751). It’s so infuriating that you’re coming up on 2 years!!

No. One year is the standard duration of that stamp. I got a stamp on Sept 15, and then a few days later got a letter in the mail for my interview on October 8. Have you tried to open a service request for outside of normal processing times?

Yikes! A lot of them really don’t know much about the process outside of their sole job within it. I don’t necessarily blame them, but, if you’re not 100% sure, you gotta look it up, or ask someone else. DMV is bad for that too.

I think you’re right - I had NO issue when I called in September, so they probably realized it was so simple that they had to go make it impossible again

Yes. My husband and I sat together at the desk for the i751 part, and then when that was done, he was told to sit behind me. For the N400, the IO went through the application, and asked all those yes or no questions. Then had me sign the application. For the test part, it was on a tablet. They put up a sentence (it’s a question - mine was “What state has the most people?”) and you have to read it aloud. And for the writing part, the IO gives you the answer to the question I read, and you write that down on the tablet (I wrote “California is the state with the most people.”) For the civics part, the questions are randomly generated on the computer, and the IO reads them, you have to provide the answer (it’s not multiple choice), and they select you answer. You only need 6/10 correct, so he only asked me 6 in total.

It feels great to finally be done!

I had my interview this morning (it was a combined 751/400). The 751 one part started okay. He asked basic questions of me and of my husband to confirm the info on our application. Then he was like “let’s see your updated documents”. Cool. I handed him updated banking statements for checking, saving, and a credit card. He went through each one and made sure all the months were there. I showed the originals for our car titles. I have updated car and health insurance documents. And I gave an updated IRS tax transcript and certified copy of the state return. I did NOT have the most recent ones (2019) because I thought I could obtain both federal and state through online portals. I was wrong, and while I did send paper requests, I didn’t receive them back in time. He did NOT like this, and it was an uncomfortable 2 minutes while I was shaking and holding back tears and my husband was rubbing my leg trying to soothe me. So my advice, if you don’t have the official documents, bring something, anything, that shows you filed. I’m so mad at myself for not even printing out the return and w2’s. Anyway, after that, it was a few more questions about why we don’t have utility bills together (I mean, I cannot get Verizon or the electric company to add a second name), about trips out of the country, and our family visiting schedule, and then that was that. At the end he approved the filing, so I’m chalking his attitude up to the fact that that’s his job is to press and see how people react. Also got approved for my n400, and due to covid, they did a same day oath ceremony. Told me it would be “30 minutes” and it was 3 hours, but hey, I’M DONE!!

I AM DONE!!! My interview was this morning at 7:45. VERY quick (less than 10 minutes for the n400 part). Then told they do same day oaths because of covid so we (it was a 751/400 combo) would need to go sit in the lobby, and that it would take “about 30 minutes”. So, 3 hours later the supervisor finally came down, and just did a group oath with the 6 or 7 of us who were waiting.

My i751 was filed in January 2019, and I filed an n400 in January 2020. In February 2020, my n400 was scheduled for an interview in April (which ended up being cancelled), but I did reach out to my congressman’s office. They were able to confirm that both the i751 and n400 would be combined at the local office. My interview for both is re-scheduled for next week. It is a LONG process, but your time is coming!

I think that if you’re denied because they suspect fraud that you would need to appear before an immigration judge. USCIS would present their case of why it seems fraudulent, and then the applicant would present their case on why it is not. At common law, the burden of proof is different for civil and criminal matters. I think immigration would fall more towards civil and the burden of proof would lie more heavily with USCIS to demonstrate it IS fraud (though the applicant should have good proof that it isn’t), but the judge can decide one way or the other on a balance of probabilities, in other words if you looked at the case percentage-wise, the judge would need to side at least 51% with either the applicant or USCIS. I’m not totally confident in my answer bc I haven’t met or read any stories about that process, but from the official documents, it seems like that would be the procedure. It’s also time consuming and costly to pursue immigration matters in court, so I reasonably assume USCIS only takes that route when there is an abundance of red flags on a case, and no clear and definitive (or even reasonable) answers to address the concerns.

First, congratulations! It must feel so great to know it’s finallllllly almost over. Can you clarify if you mean that you and your spouse were separated in different rooms for the questions, or if the IO just asked your spouse 10 questions and then you 10 questions (in the same room, together)?

As noted above, the paperwork itself is rather straightforward, so if you’re comfortable, you can do it yourself and save on attorney fees. The process as a whole depends on unique circumstances. There’s benefits and drawbacks to both the K1 and the CR-1. One of the biggest for folks is the K1 winds up costing more overall, and due to processing times, isn’t that much different. There’s also a period of time when the K1 recipient cannot work in the US, whereas a spousal visa recipient can work immediately upon entry. Ghana applicants should front load applications with as much evidence as they can produce, rather than just the bare minimum, and more visits are better than just one. I know certain countries are also part of a visa ban at the moment, so you’ll want to look into that bc if Ghana is on that list, the scope for approval becomes more narrow and will require a waiver (which is additional fees and time). Nothing is guaranteed of course, so keep that in mind. I have read some stories on here where the US Citizen lives abroad for some time to help increase chances of approval, but not sure how realistic that is for you. You will need to put in some leg work (as will your partner) if you do it yourself, but VisaJourney is great (and free!) resource to get you started.