3 ms·

I've seen people go through this process (without money involved, to be clear, they were genuinely trying to live together) in both Canada and the US and it's n

I've seen people go through this process (without money involved, to be clear, they were genuinely trying to live together) in both Canada and the US and it's nowhere near as simple or guaranteed as people think. Maybe it is in some countries, but I'd expect many 'desirable' countries are actively trying to filter out people who marry specifically for citizenship.

dudul 8y ago
Having gone through this process in the US myself, I won't dispute the "not simple" part, but how is it not guaranteed? As long as the marriage is done in good faith why would the permanent residency - and then citizenship - be denied? There is no CAP for "green cards through marriage" so no waiting list, and the residency period to transition to citizenship is shorter (3 years) than the standard (5 years I believe).
- stormbrew 8y ago
  Your question has the answer in it: because it can be denied on grounds of not being in good faith. GP post was talking about literally paying someone for marriage to obtain citizenship, literally the opposite of a good faith marriage in terms of this process. People think it's a rubber stamp, but from what I've seen it's an invasive process where they poke around all sorts of aspects of your personal life to ascertain how 'good faith' your marriage is.
  - dudul 8y ago
    Sure, the GP was talking about marriage fraud, but I was under the impression that the post I was replying too was making a general statement that GC through marriage in general was not guaranteed. My bad for misunderstanding. My XP is only one data point of course, but the process was not invasive at all. We had to provide some documentation (e.g. statements of shared bank account, utility bills with our names), go through a 30-ish minute interview where we had to explain how we met, how we got engage, etc and that was it. Now, maybe when the USCIS suspects fraud they start digging a little more and it gets painful.
    - stormbrew 8y ago
      The people I know had friends interviewed and it took quite a long time (a couple years at least) of that sort of thing for whatever reason. It still took quite a few years for even permanent residence, afaik citizenship was never even obtained. I don't doubt that the experiences vary. But the entire point of my reply was that you can't just buy into citizenship with marriage because they will deny you if they find out you did that, ergo it is not guaranteed.

dudul 8y ago

Having gone through this process in the US myself, I won't dispute the "not simple" part, but how is it not guaranteed? As long as the marriage is done in good faith why would the permanent residency - and then citizenship - be denied? There is no CAP for "green cards through marriage" so no waiting list, and the residency period to transition to citizenship is shorter (3 years) than the standard (5 years I believe).

stormbrew 8y ago
Your question has the answer in it: because it can be denied on grounds of not being in good faith. GP post was talking about literally paying someone for marriage to obtain citizenship, literally the opposite of a good faith marriage in terms of this process. People think it's a rubber stamp, but from what I've seen it's an invasive process where they poke around all sorts of aspects of your personal life to ascertain how 'good faith' your marriage is.
- dudul 8y ago
  Sure, the GP was talking about marriage fraud, but I was under the impression that the post I was replying too was making a general statement that GC through marriage in general was not guaranteed. My bad for misunderstanding. My XP is only one data point of course, but the process was not invasive at all. We had to provide some documentation (e.g. statements of shared bank account, utility bills with our names), go through a 30-ish minute interview where we had to explain how we met, how we got engage, etc and that was it. Now, maybe when the USCIS suspects fraud they start digging a little more and it gets painful.
  - stormbrew 8y ago
    The people I know had friends interviewed and it took quite a long time (a couple years at least) of that sort of thing for whatever reason. It still took quite a few years for even permanent residence, afaik citizenship was never even obtained. I don't doubt that the experiences vary. But the entire point of my reply was that you can't just buy into citizenship with marriage because they will deny you if they find out you did that, ergo it is not guaranteed.