Lori

My husband and I filed his I-130 and I-485 last year after we eloped,
but we later left the country together, essentially abandoning his
petition. I wrote a letter last November informing INS about our
leaving and asking to withdraw the petitions, but I've never received
confirmation of it. In fact, in February of 2003, after I returned to
America, I received the original receipt for the fees for the
applications we filed in June of 2002 and a letter telling him to come
pick up his employment card! Plans have changed again, and my husband
will arrive soon on an immigrant visa. Will the previous
filings/abandoned applications interfere with him being allowed entry
at the POE? He stayed on his last visit for a total of 153 days, 90
days of which were part of his free term. Will this also be a
problem?

My nerves are completely on edge. We've been separated since January
when my free term in Holland ended, and we've been waiting on Consular
processing since then. His final visa interview is April 28, and our
first wedding anniversary is May 3 when hopefully he will fly to the
U.S. to join me. I will be devastated if he isn't allowed entry. But
I would rather know of potential problems now rather than that
afternoon when i may walk away from the airport terminal without my
husband the day before our first anniversary.
     Please give your most realistic concerns or happy news. I want to
be prepared for what may happen, but if it's good news, i want to be
able to relax a little.

Thank you so very much for your help.

Lori, pensive and tired..

Ingo Pakleppa

On Mon, 21 Apr 2003 19:29:23 -0700, Lori wrote:

    > My husband and I filed his I-130 and I-485 last year after we eloped,
    > but we later left the country together, essentially abandoning his
    > petition. I wrote a letter last November informing INS about our
    > leaving and asking to withdraw the petitions, but I've never received
    > confirmation of it. In fact, in February of 2003, after I returned to
    > America, I received the original receipt for the fees for the
    > applications we filed in June of 2002 and a letter telling him to come
    > pick up his employment card!

Quite normal. INS (and now BCIS) is terribly disorganized and usually
ignores such withdrawals. Fortunately for you, the withdrawal still is
legally meaningful just by virtue of you sending it.

    > Plans have changed again, and my husband
    > will arrive soon on an immigrant visa. Will the previous
    > filings/abandoned applications interfere with him being allowed entry
    > at the POE?

Shouldn't. They will at this point determine that he abandoned the case by
leaving the country. Since he now has an immigrant visa, that won't be a
problem.

    > He stayed on his last visit for a total of 153 days, 90
    > days of which were part of his free term. Will this also be a
    > problem?

What do you mean by "free term?" Did he overstay? Well, it really doesn't
matter. Even if he overstayed (by less than 180 days), all that will be
forgiven.

    > My nerves are completely on edge. We've been separated since January
    > when my free term in Holland ended, and we've been waiting on Consular
    > processing since then. His final visa interview is April 28, and our
    > first wedding anniversary is May 3 when hopefully he will fly to the
    > U.S. to join me. I will be devastated if he isn't allowed entry. But
    > I would rather know of potential problems now rather than that
    > afternoon when i may walk away from the airport terminal without my
    > husband the day before our first anniversary.

I don't think you have much to worry about. If there is something that
would interfere with his immigrant visa, it would come up at the
consulate, so he wouldn't even be driving to the airport.

There is one thing that you may want to worry about: there are only a few
days between the interview and his flight. Often, the visa is issued right
at the interview, but it is also possible that there are additional
processing delays, especially with today's security checks. If that
happens, he could ask at the consulate if he can still travel to the US,
and/or if they would at least give him a tourist visa so he could visit
you for the first anniversary (a tourist visa will avoid problems with the
visa waiver, and because it sounds like he may have overstayed his
previous visa waiver, he may need it anyway). There is no guarantee that
they will give him the visa, but it won't hurt to ask if he has a chance.

    > Please give your most realistic concerns or happy news. I want to
    > be prepared for what may happen, but if it's good news, i want to be
    > able to relax a little.

See above... Overall, I think you are in very good shape, except for the
possible timing issue I mentioned above.