Getting married during filing process
AGood day Mrs Walker-Huntington, friend of mine is involved with someone in Jamaica; however, the person’s documents are currently before immigration authorities in the United States of America.
His mom is currently filing for her son, who is married, along with her daughters and grandchildren.
But the son was intending on getting a divorce from his wife and possibly marrying someone else. So he wanted to know how this would affect this filing process. He also wants to know if there is any way to fix it without affecting the current process. The filing has been in progress for the last five to six years and all persons are over 18 years old. I am wondering what advice you would give in this situation.
– Y.W.
Dear Y.W.,
As the married son of an American citizen, your friend is in the F3 Preference category. In the month of August 2020, visas are available in that category for persons who were filed for in June 2008. This means there is a 12-year wait for green cards as a married son/daughter of a US citizen. If the gentleman in Jamaica was filed for five to six years ago, he has another six-plus years to wait on his visa appointment.
However, keep in mind that the actual wait time will be longer because of the impact of the COVID-19 virus on visa interviews, and the fact that there is a suspension of immigration to the United States for persons in the F3 category until December 31, 2020. This means that for persons whose priority dates are current and would normally be interviewed for their permanent residency, they will not be able to be interviewed until the normal processing of interviews resumes and the suspension is terminated.
If the son gets a divorce and remains unmarried, he will move up to the F1 preference category – the unmarried son of an American citizen. Visas are currently available in that category for persons with a priority date of August 2014. Based on the approximate timing that you indicate the petition has been pending, this may put the gentleman in a situation where if he were to divorce and change categories, a visa may be immediately available for him. However, keep in mind the suspension of immigration until the end of 2020 and the backlog from the COVID-19 closures. If your friend is an American citizen and she wishes to marry the gentleman and file for him, she could, and no current immigration ban would apply to her petition. If she has no US immigration status and would seek to migrate when her boyfriend does, it would be in their best interest to have him proceed as an unmarried son, migrate, and then marry her and file for her US residency.