OldUser

Here's a list: https://hackinglawpractice.com/marital-evidence

Life is somewhat unfair in general. I wouldn't feel guilty about your employment based GC getting approved faster than other's family case. A lot of LPRs, spouses of US citizens will get an opportunity to apply for citizenship on 3 year rule, whereas you'd have to wait for 5 years of residence. So many of them can become US citizens sooner than you!

@judythebunny became LPR in December 2018 and left for a lengthy trip less few weeks after in January 2019. Are 2-3 weeks of residence sufficient to start counting eligibility from December 2018? I know, technically he's LPR based on Resident Since. But the absense is also on the borderline of 6 months. What if the OP left the US on January 3rd and came back on June 20th? That would be 169-2 = 167? Of course, can calculate more precisely if exact dates are provided. I think it'd make a much cleaner case to start counting residence since return in June 2019.

I'd advise counting 4 years and 9 months since June 2019, to be on a safe side. That would be sometime in March 2024 for N-400 submission. Maybe @Mike E can comment?

@Bavarian91 thank you for sharing! As a side note, I also noticed case statuses now being retreived super fast in CaseTrack app. Like 10x faster than before. I think this may be to do with USCIS upgrading their backend systems. No longer it takes me few minutes to refresh status for 500 cases. Now it takes a few seconds, which is great.

Got it, are you sure? What's your resident since date? Are you filing under 3 or 5 year rule? Did you have long trip outside of the US?

No problem there. A good page of contents / index page at the front of packet solves the problem for IO: ------------------------- Form I-751 - page 2-12 Bonafide marriage evidence: Joint Bank of America checking statements - Page 13-63 Joint Chase bank savings statements - Page 64-80 Joint lease agreement- Page 81-85 Joint travel - Pages 86-94 Green Card Copy - page 95 Etc etc I don't know how difficult it can be to find information if it's organized well? 🤷‍♂️

So say somebody sends only evidence since becoming LPR (instructions tell since date of marriage). Say only quarterly statements are sent to save space. Say the evidence is for the last 7 quarters (because filing 90 days early) Joint checking = 2 pages per statement, 7 quarters => 14 pages Joint savings (same as above) => 14 pages Lease (very short one, haven't moved at all) => 3 pages Photos (3 per page, 7-8 in total) => 3 pages Gas / electric bill, 2 pages per statement, 7 quarters => 14 pages Internet / Phone / Other utility, 2 pages per statement, 7 quarters => 14 pages GC copy => 1 page IRS tax return transcript => 4-8 pages (1 vs 2 years) Trip reservations, 2 pages per trip, 2 trips a year => 6 pages I-751 form itself => 11 pages This thin packet would be consisting of just 73 pages of evidence and 11 pages of form itself, 84 in total. I haven't included 2-3 affidavits, page each, car insurance / ownership, club memberships, retirement plans listing spouse, stocks, any medical stuff, birth certificates of kids (if any) in this calculation. I was very conservative with pages per statement. Most of my banks send 4-7 page statements. AFAIK it's not advisable sending partial statements with missing pages, as this can lead to RFE. I cannot wrap my head around how a modest packet can be less than 80+ pages. IMHO it must be lacking evidence?

I'd think China dual citizenship problem?

I had no issues travelling on my passport and GE while I wasn't a LPR. Being LPR with GE I had mixed experiences. A few times I entered the US using facial recognition alone with no questions asked. A few times the kiosk asked me to scan documents. As @Mike E pointed out, the right document to scan would be GC and not passport, when you become LPR. But since I have expired GC and extension letter, that doesn't work so I have to see agent on some entries. It does not prevent me from enjoying a much shorter GE line instead of loooooong regular line. I tried updating docs on the system. The GC info is there, but at enrollment center, GE folks just won't add information about extension, I tried multiple times. So have to see human whenever kiosks are not in facial recognition mode.

It's complicated, but one of my citizenships is in Western Europe. Sorry I'd like to keep the specifics out for privacy reasons.

Have a safe flight! I transited through Turkey about a month ago. Used GC + extension letter on Turkish Airlines. No issues whatsoever. However, I understand the risk of being denied was there for sure. Though I travelled within Europe and and I have a pretty strong passport to my advantage.

@WaterLeaf good luck at SSA tomorrow. FYI success story: You may also want to print out SSA doc mentioned here and give to SSA employee if they refuse to remove restrictions from SS card:

Interesting, thank you for the data point. In California, I did not experience this as an LPR.

Agreed, Real ID is a useful form of ID, but don't understand how it proves immigration status? Surely, you need immigration paper work to get it, but once you get it there's no difference between Real ID of a USC vs LPR? The license itself doesn't show immigration status on it AFAIK?

I will support this, perhaps, unpopular opinion. Whenever I read I-751 instructions and interpret them literally, I come to that conclusion: - "Submit copies of documents indicating that the marriage upon which you were granted status was entered in good faith and was not for the purpose of circumventing immigration laws. Submit copies of as many documents as you can to establish this fact, to demonstrate the circumstances of the relationship from the date of the marriage to the present date;" This is supported by a few lawyers I asked this question (including the one I worked with), and by Jim Hacking (YouTube guy) too. It's always immigrant's burden to prove they're eligible for a benefit. I'm not advocating sending local bus schedules to USCIS. Only relevant information supporting bonafide marriage in whatever volume it takes: if it's 1000 pages, let it be 1000 pages. In a nicely organized packet, officer can easily find whatever they're interested in. In my personal experience, there's no way IO will read every letter in a bank statement. Unless there's something specific they're looking for, they'll get a few samples from here and there and make a decision. Solid packet will be a good indicator the applicant takes immigration laws and rules seriously. It will also highlight the effort that went into collecting ans organizing evidence.

Found an interesting article on DailyMail. Some quotes: - "America currently has one of the Western world's easiest citizenship tests" (note the use of toponym America VS USA 🥲) - "About 96 per cent of applicants are able to pass the current citizenship exam, according to recent estimates." - "More than 1 million people became US citizens in fiscal year 2022 - one of the highest numbers on record since 1907, the earliest year with available data - and USCIS reduced the huge backlog of naturalisation applications by over 60 per cent compared to the year before, according to a USCIS report also released in December." Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-12318813/US-citizenship-test.html

Just curious to see what beverage is more popular among all of us

Wanted to ask this question as I see more and more threads referring to the term "neutralization", when filing form N-400.