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Yes, but as a prominent member here points out every time this comes up, plenty do since super-technically MFS requires an ITIN too and there are people who don’t feel like paper filing or going through the ITIN process. Why the computer requires a tax ID for people who aren’t eligible without MFJ is beyond me. It’s not materially different from MFS unless you live in a community property state, are eligible for certain anti-poverty credits, or make more than $120k. Your tax advisor isn’t allowed to use the word “materiality” with you until it’s on the third round with the IRS, but you’re allowed to consider it when making choices on your tax filings and the IRS does when taking enforcement action. That being said, I agree with you. It’s almost never beneficial in these cases to file MFS or single. The main reason is you don’t feel like paper filing, but you’ll eventually need to paper file to amend anyway, so that makes no sense to me either. Especially with the access to the U.S. banking and credit system that an ITIN brings. For most people it should be a no brainer, and I think we should talk more about those benefits.

Thanks; I think what got us approved was using my income as his. Amex is willing to take risks with no credit history if there’s sufficient income, so it worked in our favor. Like you said — it really helps with building the credit history which is the main reason we did it. I know the file jointly vs. file single debate is always difficult for people, so wanted to provide context for why filing jointly with an ITIN can help while you’re waiting. Obviously it’s not for everyone, but it provides a lot of non-tax benefits as well,

Are they or have they ever been a member of the Communist Party/youth league? Or association with someone who was? That would be the first thing that I’d think of that might complicate things from a communist country. It’s still an admissibility issue. Not assuming anything, just trying to think of things that might cause delay if USCIS became aware and there’s no issue on the petitioner end.

Got it; and best of luck. To be clear, no judgement on my part, but I think you’re unfortunately in a lot harder place than most others so collecting as much evidence as you can in preparation for the eventuality that you’ll file either K-1 or CR-1 would be best. As others have said, for K-1, it’ll eventually have to be on paper.

It’s also Adam Walsh Act, which means a lawyer absolutely should be involved. OP — the best advice you see going to get here is to find a competent lawyer with experience in these areas and do exactly what they say. Emphasis on competent. Your post history also suggests multiple partners from Ukraine within the last year (posted about a female partner there on 9/6/24 and then asked for matchmaking references later that month) so I second the suggestion to front load as much as possible. If it smells fishy to people on an immigration forum that are generally pro-immigrant, it’ll also probably smell fishy to USCIS.

I second Amex. We just got one for my husband who still lives in Chile when the IRS issued us an ITIN. They approved us no problem without needing a secured card and Chile is not one of the countries where they share credit history with. The issue is likely that there’s no credit history at all and the SSN isn’t in any of the SSN trace databases. Amex will request you upload a scan of the social security card and your passport and then they’ll manually review. They made us do that for ITIN and approved within 24 hours after the upload.

Also if you want to become a federal contractor or employee after naturalizing. In that case since they’re aware of the difference in SAVE, probably worth typing up a two sentence explanation on the SF-85P or SF-86. Won’t affect many but worth mentioning in case this impacts others.

Just wanted to provide this as a recent reference point: husband and I filed joint 2024 taxes making the 6013(g) election to treat him as a U.S. person for the limited purpose of filing a joint return (does not trigger FBAR when done under 6013(g).) Filed in-person: 4/26/2025 ITIN letter received: 7/3/2025 Applied for Amex Blue Cash Everyday: 7/3/2025 Additional documents requested: 7/3/2025 Amex approved: 7/4/2025 Our joke was that there’s was no better way to celebrate the Fourth than opening a credit card. Something worth noting: US law allows credit card applicants to treat their spouses income as theirs so long as they could reasonably access it to pay debts. We provided our joint income as his income, and used my address and phone number. Amex requested that we call after we submitted the application on the website, and the person on the phone told us we’d need to provide his passport, a copy of the ITIN letter, and a signed declaration about his U.S. military status. Did that same day and were approved around 24 hours after uploading. It was helpful he was visiting me in the US for this since he could talk directly with the customer service representative when we had to call. We clarified with them that he still lived in Chile and they confirmed that wasn’t an issue so long as he could provide a passport scan and ITIN. His approval was only in his name and was on a non-secured card. The reason we went for the Amex Blue Cash Everyday is that it has no annual fee and Amex has a practice where at 91 days they will provide a generous credit line increase (up to triple), which also helps building the credit score. They’re also pretty liberal with giving out unsecured credit cards to people with no credit history so long as income is high enough. I know not everyone filed taxes jointly while waiting, but wanted to provide this as a data point for one of the benefits getting an ITIN can provide for people who are waiting on consular processing.

Sounds like you got lucky. They did what you want them to do. Sometimes they make people file form I-824 and pay $590 in circumstances like yours.

Three reasons for that: 1) Cigarettes beyond the exemption limit are subject to both excise tax and customs duty and unlike alcohol where it’s harder for it to add up due to the weight of liquids and what most people are transporting, cigarettes you can get to material tax owed very easily. 2) A few decades ago smuggling cigarettes into the U.S. was a major funding source for Hezbollah and so CBP never really quite got over giving them extra scrutiny even if it hasn’t been an issue in a minute. 3) There’s complex regulations around re-importing US exported cigarettes and it isn’t permitted beyond a small quantity for tax reasons, so they want to verify those don’t apply. 1 and 3 are the bigger deals: CBP is a taxation agency as much as they are border police and they take the taxation bit very seriously.

Not to mention that when questions get asked, things get looked at, even if all they officially get is the same response you do.

That doesn’t answer what date she was DQ’d. My back of the napkin math is that you’re within normal processing times, but we don’t know enough right now to compare to norms.

https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/us-visas/visa-information-resources/iv-wait-times.html You can check what DQ months they are scheduling currently at the URL above. Lima is April 2025, so like Appleblossom said, expect 6ish months.

Could you fill out your timeline, including country? Usually getting passed over during the normal processing times is either because it’s a complicated case or it’s from a more “complex” country where it’s more difficult to run even the basic checks on the beneficiary that USCIS handles. African countries tend to lag behind 3-5 months from anecdotal reports I’ve seen, as an example. An example of a complexity outside of the country would be a case with multiple divorces to foreign spouses, the petitioner having certain criminal convictions, or pretty much anything that could be considered a departure from the mean.

If you’ve been conditionally approved see if they offer GE interview on arrival at the airport you’re flying into. That way you kill two birds with one stone. GE is awesome. Beats even the European eGates on efficiency once you have the interview Edit to add link to enrollment on arrival: Enrollment on Arrival

From memory it only populates if you say “yes” to the initial question about if they’re in the U.S. currently on the radio button or drop down (I could be wrong though, I can’t go back and check ours.) I’d double check to make sure there’s not an initial question that was answered incorrectly. Or I could be wrong, but worth double checking.

1) Passport; you provide travel document if she doesn’t have a passport 2) If she’s not physically in the U.S. when the I-130 is filed this isn’t applicable

Freetown is currently scheduling interviews for visa applicants that were DQ’d in January 2024. If your PD is November 2024, your DQ date couldn’t be much earlier than January or February 2024. What was the date you were DQ’d? If it’s January 2024 or later, you’re within normal processing times.

So much of this is pre-screening. They already know who they want to talk to. Most airlines begin sharing passport data with CBP to verify ESTA status 72 hours before. If there’s a big issue that prevents VWP eligibility, they will cancel it in this time period. From the example I know: Chile recently started sharing more data with CBP so CBP is currently in the process of cancelling improperly granted ESTAs. They do it at the airport before the plane takes off and you aren’t permitted boarding even if you’ve already checked in. Once the plane is in the air the airline sends the final passenger list to CBP. During that time CBP reviews the results of automated checks requiring human intervention, and check for individuals with permission to get on the plane who might not be admissible but who didn’t flag with conclusive proof in the ESTA checks or who have a visa so don’t go through those checks. They also tend to have a pretty strong focus on the customs portion: there was a story the published recently about catching someone trying to smuggle in $183k of luxury French goods who didn’t realize the French shared the VAT reimbursement receipts with CBP. By the time you’re at the airport they have a list of the people they want to talk to and the conversation they have with you is doing surface level risk assessment to see if you admit to a red flag the screening missed because you weren’t on any list. If you use one of the automated or semi-automated entries (GE or MPC) that minimizes questions as a lot of the data is already loaded into the system without human interaction so there’s less time to ask questions while typing. If you have an ESTA and are allowed to enter the plane there’s a low risk of being denied entry. If you successfully use MPC, it’s lowered, and GE makes that even lower since they’ve already done extensive vetting before. None of that guarantees anything, the person I mentioned above with $183k of undeclared goods was caught by the GE program. But if you aren’t breaking any laws it really is unlikely you will be flagged by any of the pre-entry systems, which means it’s likely you will be admitted.

Expanding more on my comment: the advice I was given here was that since we were planning on going back to Chile within days of the wedding, to wait until we’d left so not to confuse USCIS why someone inside the U.S. wanted an interview in Santiago. You can check CBP’s I-94 website by looking at the travel history (Search->See travel history) and it will tell you if they’ve processed a departure: I-94 website Reason I suggest waiting until that is updated is that if you file online they do some automated checks and you don’t want to flag anything if CBP’s records at the time show her in the US and you filed the form saying she wasn’t. Website can take 12-48 hours to update. Plenty of time for you to draft the petition and then click submit once it shows her leaving the country.

We filed the second CBP had updated the I-94 website to show he had left the country.

Since you’ve been here before use MPC and it’ll minimize your chances of questions (not as much as global entry, but still they ask less.) My husband just landed in the U.S. from Chile this AM on an ESTA and they only asked him why he was hear and how long he was staying, no request for documents etc. even in the normal line. CBP really is trying to automate things as much as possible for VWP countries to minimize judgement calls by frontline officers (cuts both ways…) if you’re a VWP national, don’t have anything flagging in their automated checks after the API is submitted, and don’t proactively volunteer anything stupid (you are not required to tell them you aren’t getting a job unless they ask, for example), you should be fine. My husband is from the highest denied entry VWP program country and they’ve not once mentioned the I-130 we have pending to him. VWP and no criminal record or vacations to unfriendly countries counts for a lot.

Because it’s the universal experience with the USCIS Random Number Generator (dba MyProgress) USCIS is remarkably consistent in the timing of straightforward cases filed around the same time. If you have no issues, you will be approved around the same time most people from the week you filed were. Currently the average wait time is 14.5 months. It’s been as high as 17, but is on a downward trend. I filed in January at the height of the consular I-130 delays and my estimated time has been at 19 months since day 1 and hasn’t moved. USCIS hasn’t taken that long (on average) in recent memory and there’s nothing complex in my case. My petition for my spouse is likely to be approved early next year.

My progress is a random number generator that has nothing to do with your case progress. It can be safely be ignored and you can keep uploading unsolicited evidence to help strengthen your case.

Husband just entered the US via Miami. Tried to use MPC, but it was down at MIA this AM apparently. Asked him reason for the trip (“to go to a wedding”, we’re going to one this weekend) and how long he was staying and sent him on his merry way with no fuss. No questions at all about the pending I-130.