3 ms·

The short, unpopular, possibly illegal answer: Get fucking married (to a US permanent resident or citizen)! This is more common than you think. It was more co

by yardie 4y ago

The short, unpopular, possibly illegal answer: Get fucking married (to a US permanent resident or citizen)! This is more common than you think. It was more common than I thought! USCIS is dumpster fire purgatory and any competent, results driven lawyer will tell you so.

wobbly_bush 4y ago
There is nothing illegal or unpopular about this answer. It doesn't happen as commonly due to large cultural differences, and there is more to life than just a visa (as important as that might be).
- User23 4y ago
  It's illegal to fraudulently marry for the purpose of gaining permanent residency. Obviously there's some gray area there and I'm not giving legal advice, but at least sometimes using marriage to get residency or citizenship is a crime.
  - nrmitchi 4y ago
    The word "fraudulently" is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. As I understand it, the bar to get into "fraud" territory is actually pretty far down the spectrum. Dating people and limiting people you go on dates with the "US Citizens" because you want to be able to actually have a life that doesn't involve one/both of you being deported is 100% not fraud, or illegal. If you main reason for having a relationship with someone is to get a green card, but you still have a bonafide relationship with that person, it is not illegal. It may make you a shitty person, but it's not illegal. A conspiracy to lie to USCIS about your relationship, which typically involves purposely arranging and/or fabricating evidence of a relationship *is* fraud, and is definitely illegal.
    - dboreham 4y ago
      They made a whole movie about this. My wife and I had the amusing task of learning all kinds of obscure facts about each other ahead of my interview, since we had seen the movie and knew they would ask about which end of the toothpaste tube the other squeezes... But in the end the person conducting the interview seemed to have seen the movie too and determined that we were bickering sufficiently about our answers to prove the marriage was legit ;)
nrmitchi 4y ago
I'm not going to disagree that this definitely happens a lot, but it's definitely not an option for many people who have been stuck in a backlog for 10 years and are already married/have children with a spouse that immigrated with them.

by yardie 4y ago

wobbly_bush 4y ago

There is nothing illegal or unpopular about this answer. It doesn't happen as commonly due to large cultural differences, and there is more to life than just a visa (as important as that might be).

User23 4y ago
It's illegal to fraudulently marry for the purpose of gaining permanent residency. Obviously there's some gray area there and I'm not giving legal advice, but at least sometimes using marriage to get residency or citizenship is a crime.
- nrmitchi 4y ago
  The word "fraudulently" is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. As I understand it, the bar to get into "fraud" territory is actually pretty far down the spectrum. Dating people and limiting people you go on dates with the "US Citizens" because you want to be able to actually have a life that doesn't involve one/both of you being deported is 100% not fraud, or illegal. If you main reason for having a relationship with someone is to get a green card, but you still have a bonafide relationship with that person, it is not illegal. It may make you a shitty person, but it's not illegal. A conspiracy to lie to USCIS about your relationship, which typically involves purposely arranging and/or fabricating evidence of a relationship *is* fraud, and is definitely illegal.
  - dboreham 4y ago
    They made a whole movie about this. My wife and I had the amusing task of learning all kinds of obscure facts about each other ahead of my interview, since we had seen the movie and knew they would ask about which end of the toothpaste tube the other squeezes... But in the end the person conducting the interview seemed to have seen the movie too and determined that we were bickering sufficiently about our answers to prove the marriage was legit ;)

nrmitchi 4y ago

I'm not going to disagree that this definitely happens a lot, but it's definitely not an option for many people who have been stuck in a backlog for 10 years and are already married/have children with a spouse that immigrated with them.