Rayeye

Hi,

I have a few questions which I hope that you will be able to help me with.

If a Permanent Resident petitioned his unmarried and under 21 son from China and has been given a priority date. The Permanent Resident has not Naturalized into a United States Citizen and because of this, the son should be able to travel to the United States immediately.

The son now wants to get married. My questions are:

1) Can the petitioner notify INS to amend the I-130 and add the son's wife to the son's I-130 or does he have to file a new one for the son's wife?

2) Will the Priority Date stay the same for both the son and his wife?

3) How long will it take for both the son and his wife to travel to America?

Thanks!!

Sylvia Ottemoeller

"Rayeye" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:415743.1032110725@britishexpats-
.com...

    > I have a few questions which I hope that you will be able to
    > help me with.
    > If a Permanent Resident petitioned his unmarried and under 21 son from
    > China and has been given a priority date. The Permanent Resident has
    > not Naturalized into a United States Citizen and because of this, the
    > son should be able to travel to the United States immediately.
    > The son now wants to get married. My questions are:
    > 1) Can the petitioner notify INS to amend the I-130 and add the
    > son's wife to the son's I-130 or does he have to file a new one
    > for the son's wife?

I assume that by "The Permanent Resident has not Naturalized" you mean "The
Permanent Resident has *now* Naturalized" because otherwise the sentence
does not make sense.

You did not say whether the petition is still pending. It is very difficult
to get an I-130 approved on an expedited basis, when it was filed in a
category which takes a long time. The usual processing time at some of the
INS Service Centers for non-immediate relative I-130s is several years. I
would say the only chance of expedited processing is probably through asking
the assistance of the petitioner's Congressperson.

You also did not say what the prioritiy date is.

When the father became a U.S. citizen, the petition was automatically
converted from Family 2A to immediate relative by operation of law. The
petitioner does not take any action to convert the category.

The son should marry before he immigrates, because otherwise the
daughter-in-law will have several years' wait before she can immigrate in
category Family 2A based on the son't petition.

If the son marries before he immigrates, the I-130 petition will
automatically be converted from immediate relative to Family 3, married son
or daughter of a U.S. citizen, by operation of law. There is a wait for the
quota in that category.

    > 2) Will the Priority Date stay the same for both the son and his
    > wife?

Yes, if they marry before the son immigrates.

    > 3) How long will it take for both the son and his wife to travel
    > to America?

You can figure out the approximate wait for the quota by checking the
priority date against the cutoff date for Family 3. After that, it may take
any amount of time from a few months to about a year, depending on whether
the petition has been approved, whether it has arrived at the National Visa
Center, and whether the NVC has become aware of the change of category and
is acting on that knowledge.