Family-Based Immigration: Petitions, Priority Dates, and Adjustment of Status

Summary. How the family system is structured, where the waits come from, and where cases fail.

Two questions, and everything follows from them

Family-based immigration reduces to two questions, asked in order:

One: is there a qualifying relationship? A petition establishes it. The categories are defined by statute at 8 U.S.C. § 1153, the definitions at § 1101, and the petition procedure at § 1154 and 8 C.F.R. Part 204.

Two: is a visa available? For some relatives, always. For others, after a wait that can exceed twenty years.

These two questions are independent, and confusing them is the single most common misunderstanding in this area. An approved petition does not mean a visa. It means the relationship is established and the applicant is now in line.

A third question decides everything about how the case is processed: is the person admissible? 8 U.S.C. § 1182 lists the grounds of inadmissibility, and an otherwise perfect case fails on them. This is where most cases actually go wrong.

The categories, and why they matter so much

Immediate relatives of U.S. citizens are not subject to numerical limits. There is no line and no priority date wait:

Spouses of U.S. citizens
Unmarried children under 21 of U.S. citizens
Parents of U.S. citizens who are at least 21

Everyone else falls into a preference category with an annual cap:

F1 — Unmarried sons and daughters (21 or older) of U.S. citizens F2A — Spouses and unmarried children under 21 of permanent residents F2B — Unmarried sons and daughters (21 or older) of permanent residents F3 — Married sons and daughters of U.S. citizens F4 — Brothers and sisters of U.S. citizens, where the citizen is at least 21

Two structural facts follow, and they drive most planning decisions:

A permanent resident cannot petition for a married child, or for a parent, or for a sibling — at all. Those categories exist only for citizens. This is a substantial reason to naturalize.

Marriage changes the category. A U.S. citizen's unmarried adult child is F1; if that child marries, the case converts to F3, which is generally slower. And an F2B beneficiary — the unmarried adult child of a permanent resident — has no category at all if they marry while the petitioner is still a permanent resident. The petition is revoked.

Which produces a genuine planning problem that people discover at the wrong moment, and it is worth understanding before a wedding is scheduled.

Priority dates and the visa bulletin

The priority date is the date the petition was properly filed. It is your place in line, and it belongs to you — it can generally be retained if a later petition is filed in certain circumstances.

Each month, the State Department publishes a visa bulletin with cutoff dates by category and by country of chargeability. When your priority date is earlier than the cutoff for your category and country, a visa is available.

The bulletin has two charts, and the difference matters:

Final Action Dates — when a visa may actually be issued and permanent residence granted.

Dates for Filing — when an applicant may submit the application, which may be earlier. Whether the earlier chart may be used for adjustment of status is announced monthly, so it must be checked, not assumed.

Country of chargeability is generally the country of birth, not citizenship. Because each country is subject to a per-country limit, applicants born in countries with high demand — Mexico, the Philippines, India, and China, most prominently — face substantially longer waits in the same category.

The waits are not small. In the longest categories they are measured in decades. An F4 sibling petition filed today for a beneficiary born in a high-demand country may not become current within the petitioner's working life.

Cross-chargeability is a real and underused rule: a spouse may sometimes be charged to the other spouse's country of birth, and a child to a parent's, when that produces a shorter wait.

And a critical practical point: file the petition even if the wait is long. The priority date starts running when the petition is filed. Waiting to file because "the line is too long" simply starts the same line later.

Aging out, and the protection against it

A child who turns 21 falls out of the child categories, which can convert a case from immediate relative to preference, or from F2A to F2B — turning a short wait into a long one.

The Child Status Protection Act addresses this, and its mechanics are worth knowing:

For immediate relatives, age is generally locked at the date the petition is filed. A child who is 20 when the petition is filed remains a "child" for that petition.

For preference categories, the calculation subtracts the time the petition was pending from the beneficiary's age at the time the visa became available. If the resulting number is under 21, the child status is preserved — but only if the beneficiary "sought to acquire" permanent residence within one year of visa availability.

That one-year requirement is where cases are lost. A family that waits fifteen years and then takes eighteen months to file loses the protection. When the priority date becomes current, act immediately.

And note: when a petitioner naturalizes, an F2A case for a child automatically converts to immediate relative, which usually helps. When a petitioner naturalizes and the beneficiary is an unmarried adult child, an F2B case converts to F1 — which in some countries is actually slower, and an election to remain in F2B is available.

Adjustment of status versus consular processing

Once a visa is available, there are two ways to become a permanent resident, and choosing between them is often the most consequential decision in the case.

Adjustment of status under 8 U.S.C. § 1255 and 8 C.F.R. Part 245 happens inside the United States, without leaving.

Consular processing happens at a U.S. consulate abroad, which requires departing the country.

Why the choice matters so much: departure can trigger a bar on returning. A person who accrued more than 180 days of unlawful presence and then leaves faces a three-year bar; more than a year of unlawful presence triggers a ten-year bar. The bar attaches on departure. Someone who has been living in the country without status and travels abroad for a consular interview may be barred at the interview from returning for a decade.

Which is why the eligibility rules for adjustment are so important. Adjustment generally requires a lawful entry — an inspection and admission or parole — and generally requires that status was maintained, subject to significant exceptions.

The most important exception: immediate relatives are generally exempt from the requirement of having maintained status and from bars based on unauthorized employment — but the requirement of a lawful entry still applies in most circumstances.

Which produces the defining fact pattern of this area: a person who entered lawfully on a visa, overstayed, and married a U.S. citizen can usually adjust status inside the country without ever triggering a bar. A person who entered without inspection and married the same U.S. citizen generally cannot adjust, must process abroad, and faces the ten-year bar on departure.

For the second person, a waiver process exists — a provisional waiver of the unlawful presence ground, applied for and approved before departure, so the applicant knows the outcome before leaving. This changed the calculus enormously and is one of the most important developments in this area. It requires demonstrating extreme hardship to a qualifying U.S. citizen or permanent resident relative.

Inadmissibility: where cases actually fail

8 U.S.C. § 1182 is the section that decides most difficult cases, and it is long. The categories that matter most in family cases:

Unlawful presence — the three- and ten-year bars, and a permanent bar for those who accrued a year of unlawful presence, departed, and reentered or attempted to reenter without admission.

Fraud or misrepresentation of a material fact to obtain an immigration benefit. A waiver exists, requiring extreme hardship to a qualifying relative.

False claim to U.S. citizenship. This is among the harshest grounds in the statute — for claims made after a specified date there is generally no waiver. It arises far more often than people expect: a checked box on an employment eligibility form, a voter registration completed at a motor vehicle office, a statement on a loan application.

Criminal grounds — crimes involving moral turpitude, controlled substance offenses, multiple convictions, prostitution, and others. Some have waivers; drug offenses are the most restricted.

Health-related grounds — a communicable disease of public health significance, absence of required vaccinations (waivable), a physical or mental disorder with associated harmful behavior, and drug abuse or addiction.

Public charge — the likelihood of becoming primarily dependent on the government for subsistence, assessed on statutory factors including age, health, family status, assets, resources, financial status, education, and skills, and with the affidavit of support as a central element.

Prior removal orders — which carry their own bars and may require consent to reapply.

Unlawful voting and certain security and terrorism grounds, which are broad.

The practical instruction: the inadmissibility analysis should be done before the petition is filed, not after the interview is scheduled. Discovering a permanent bar at a consulate abroad, after the family has sold the house, is the worst version of this process.

The affidavit of support

Nearly every family-based case requires a sponsor to sign an affidavit of support, and it is not a formality.

What it does: the sponsor contracts with the U.S. government to maintain the immigrant at a specified percentage of the federal poverty guidelines, and to reimburse agencies for certain means-tested public benefits the immigrant receives.

Who must sign: the petitioner, always. If the petitioner's income is insufficient, a joint sponsor may also sign — a separate person meeting the requirements independently.

Income requirements are stated as a percentage of the federal poverty guidelines for the sponsor's household size, with a lower threshold for certain military sponsors. Assets can substitute for income at a defined multiple.

And here is what surprises people: the obligation is legally enforceable, by the government and by the sponsored immigrant. It survives divorce. It survives estrangement. It ends only on defined events — the immigrant naturalizing, being credited with 40 qualifying quarters of work, permanently departing, dying, or ceasing to be a permanent resident.

Divorce does not end it. A sponsored spouse who divorces the sponsor may sue the sponsor to enforce the support obligation, and courts have entertained those actions.

Which means the affidavit deserves the attention given to a loan guarantee, because that is essentially what it is.

Marriage cases and conditional residence

Where residence is granted based on a marriage less than two years old at the time, residence is conditional for two years, and a joint petition to remove the conditions must be filed in the ninety-day window before the second anniversary.

Failure to file terminates residence, and it happens — people forget, or separate, or assume the card renews.

If the marriage has ended, a waiver of the joint filing requirement is available on several grounds:

The marriage was entered in good faith but was terminated by divorce or annulment
The applicant or a child was subjected to battery or extreme cruelty
Termination of residence would cause extreme hardship

Good faith at the time of the marriage is what matters, not whether it lasted. A marriage that was real and then failed supports a waiver; the evidence is the same evidence that supports the original case.

What proves a marriage is real — and what to keep from the beginning:

Joint tax returns · a joint lease or deed · joint bank and credit accounts with actual joint activity · insurance policies naming each other · beneficiary designations · children's birth certificates · photographs across the whole relationship with other people in them, not just posed couple photos · correspondence and travel together · affidavits from people who know the couple, with specific detail rather than conclusions · joint utility bills · shared medical and school records.

What does not prove much: a stack of selfies, a joint account opened last month with a hundred dollars in it, or affidavits that all say the same three sentences.

And the interview in a marriage case can be a separate, more intensive interview where the officer suspects fraud — spouses questioned separately, answers compared. Preparation for it is legitimate and appropriate; coaching a false story is a serious federal offense with consequences including a permanent bar.

Four families, four very different paths

The Okonkwo family. Chidinma is a U.S. citizen. She marries Emeka, who entered on a student visa in 2019, finished his program, and overstayed by two years.

He is an immediate relative. He entered lawfully. He can adjust status inside the country. The overstay does not bar him, because immediate relatives are excepted from the maintained-status requirement. He never leaves, never triggers a bar, and receives conditional residence about a year later. This is the smoothest path in the entire system, and the reason is a single fact: he was inspected and admitted at a port of entry.

The Herrera family. Ana is a U.S. citizen. She marries Julio, who entered without inspection in 2016 and has been here since.

Same relationship. Completely different case. Julio generally cannot adjust status, because he was not inspected and admitted. Consular processing means departing — and departing after nine years of unlawful presence triggers the ten-year bar.

The path that exists: apply for a provisional waiver of the unlawful presence ground before departing, demonstrating that Ana would suffer extreme hardship if he were barred. If the waiver is approved, he departs, attends the consular interview, and returns — a trip measured in weeks rather than a decade.

If he departs without the waiver approved, he is gone for ten years. The provisional waiver exists precisely to prevent that, and this is the case type it was built for.

The Nguyen family. Bao is a permanent resident who petitioned for his unmarried adult daughter, Linh, in 2014 — category F2B. The wait in her country is long. In 2024 Linh, who is 34 and living abroad, gets engaged.

If she marries while her father is still a permanent resident, the petition is revoked. There is no category for the married child of a permanent resident.

What can save it: if Bao naturalizes before the marriage, the petition converts to F1 (unmarried adult child of a citizen), and if she then marries, it converts again to F3 (married child of a citizen) — a category that is slow but exists.

So the sequence matters absolutely. Naturalize, then marry: the case survives in F3. Marry first: the case is gone and must start over, if a category is even available. Nobody tells families this, and it costs cases every year.

The Kaur family. Harpreet is a U.S. citizen who filed an F4 petition for her brother in 2009. It becomes current in 2035. Her brother's children were 8 and 11 when she filed.

They are derivative beneficiaries — a spouse and unmarried children under 21 of a preference beneficiary can accompany or follow to join. But by 2035 the children are 34 and 37.

The Child Status Protection Act calculation applies, subtracting the petition's pending time from their age at visa availability. If that number is still over 21, they have aged out and must be petitioned separately by their father once he immigrates — starting a new, long wait.

The lesson the Kaur family learned late: in the longest categories, the derivative children are the real casualty of the wait. Planning that accounts for them — including whether an alternate path exists for them independently — should start when the petition is filed, not when it becomes current.

How to read a visa bulletin without getting it wrong

Four pieces of information determine your answer, and people routinely get two of them wrong.

One: your category. Immediate relative (no wait), F1, F2A, F2B, F3, or F4. Determined by the petitioner's status and the relationship as they exist now, not as they existed at filing.

Two: your country of chargeability. Generally the beneficiary's country of birth — not citizenship, not current residence. A person born in India who holds Canadian citizenship is charged to India.

Cross-chargeability may help: a spouse may be charged to the other spouse's country of birth, and a child may be charged to a parent's, if that produces an earlier date. This is a real rule and it is underused. It can shorten a wait by years.

Three: your priority date. The date the petition was properly filed. It is on the receipt notice and the approval notice. Write it down and never lose it.

Four: which chart to use. The bulletin publishes Final Action Dates and Dates for Filing. Which one governs an adjustment application is announced each month. For consular cases, the National Visa Center's instructions govern. Check the announcement rather than assuming, because it changes.

Then the comparison: find your category, find your country column, and compare your priority date to the listed date. If your priority date is earlier than the listed date, you are current.

Two symbols matter: "C" means current — no wait, everyone in the category can proceed. "U" means unavailable — nobody in the category can proceed that month.

And the thing nobody warns about: dates can retrogress. A category that was current in March can move backward in June, pushing applicants who were about to file back into the queue. When your date becomes current, act immediately. The window is not guaranteed to stay open.

The unlawful presence bars, precisely

These are the provisions that trap the most people, and the details matter.

Unlawful presence accrues when a person is present after the expiration of an authorized stay, or is present without having been admitted or paroled.

It generally does not accrue while a person is under 18, while a properly filed asylum application is pending, while certain other applications are pending, or for certain protected categories.

The bars:

More than 180 days but less than one year of unlawful presence, followed by a departure: a three-year bar on admission.

One year or more of unlawful presence, followed by a departure: a ten-year bar.

The critical structural point: the bar is triggered by the departure, not by the presence. A person who has accrued five years of unlawful presence and never leaves has no bar operating against them. The moment they step across the border, the ten-year clock starts.

And there is a harsher provision for a person who accrued more than one year of unlawful presence in the aggregate, departed, and then entered or attempted to enter without admission. That produces a bar that generally cannot be waived for ten years, and then only with permission to reapply. This is often called the permanent bar, and it is the single most damaging thing many people do to their own cases — usually by reentering after a removal or a long unlawful stay, without knowing what it costs.

The waivers:

For the three- and ten-year bars, a waiver is available on a showing of extreme hardship to a U.S. citizen or permanent resident spouse or parent. Note who is not on that list: children. Hardship to a U.S. citizen child does not by itself support this waiver — a fact that shocks families and is one of the most misunderstood rules in the system.

The provisional waiver allows the application to be filed and decided before departure, so an applicant knows the outcome before leaving. This is the single most important procedural development for families in this situation.

What "extreme hardship" means in practice: more than the ordinary separation and financial difficulty that any family would face. The showing is built from documented specifics — a qualifying relative's medical condition and treatment records, country conditions where relocation would occur, financial records showing the actual consequences, evidence of caregiving obligations, mental health evaluations, and educational disruption. Hardship in the aggregate can be extreme even when no single factor is.

Public charge and the affidavit of support, in practice

The public charge ground asks whether the person is likely to become primarily dependent on the government for subsistence. The affidavit of support is the primary answer to it in a family case.

The mechanics:

The petitioner must sign, regardless of income.

Income must meet a threshold stated as a percentage of the federal poverty guidelines for the sponsor's household size — counting the sponsor, dependents, the immigrant, and anyone else already sponsored.

If income is short, three options:

Assets may substitute, at a defined multiple of the shortfall. Home equity, savings, and securities can count; the asset must be convertible to cash within a year.
Household member income may be added, where the member lives in the household and signs a contract agreeing to make their income available.
A joint sponsor may sign a separate affidavit, meeting the requirement independently. A joint sponsor need not be related but must be a citizen or permanent resident, domiciled in the U.S., and at least 18.

Documentation: the most recent federal tax return or transcript (three years is often better), W-2s, current pay statements, an employer letter, and asset documentation where used.

Domicile is a real requirement and it trips up petitioners living abroad. A citizen living overseas must establish domicile in the United States, or show intent to reestablish it by a date certain, before the affidavit is sufficient.

And the enforceability question, again, because it is genuinely underappreciated: this is a contract with the government, enforceable by the government and by the sponsored immigrant. It survives divorce. A sponsor who divorces and then discovers the obligation persists is in a fight they did not know they had joined.

The obligation ends only when the immigrant: naturalizes · is credited with 40 qualifying quarters of work · permanently departs the U.S. · dies · or ceases to be a permanent resident and departs. Divorce is not on the list. Estrangement is not on the list.

What actually happens, step by step

Stage one: the petition. The petitioner files, establishing the relationship, under 8 U.S.C. § 1154 and 8 C.F.R. Part 204. What it needs: proof of the petitioner's status, proof of the relationship, and — in marriage cases — evidence the marriage is bona fide.

The receipt notice arrives with the priority date on it. Keep it forever.

Stage two: the wait, for preference categories. During this time: keep the agency informed of address changes, keep the relationship documentation current, and watch for changes that alter the category — a marriage, a naturalization, a child turning 21.

Stage three: visa availability. The priority date becomes current. Act within one year, both because of the Child Status Protection Act requirement and because dates can retrogress.

Stage four, path A: adjustment of status. The application is filed with the agency inside the United States, with the medical examination, the affidavit of support, and supporting documents. Work authorization and advance parole can generally be requested at the same time, which matters enormously for a family waiting a year.

Warning about advance parole: traveling on advance parole while an unlawful presence bar would otherwise apply is legally complicated, and departure can still create problems in some circumstances. Do not travel on advance parole without checking.

Stage four, path B: consular processing. The case moves to the National Visa Center, fees are paid, the civil documents and affidavit of support are submitted, and when the file is complete the case is scheduled at the consulate. The applicant completes a medical examination with a panel physician and attends the interview abroad.

Stage five: the medical examination. Required either way, performed by a designated civil surgeon (in the U.S.) or panel physician (abroad). It covers communicable diseases of public health significance, required vaccinations, physical and mental disorders with associated harmful behavior, and drug abuse or addiction. Vaccination requirements are waivable on religious or moral grounds and for medical contraindication; the others generally are not, though some have waivers.

Bring your vaccination records. Reconstructing them costs time and money.

Stage six: the interview. Identity, the application, the relationship, and admissibility. In marriage cases, the relationship is examined in more depth. Bring originals of everything.

Stage seven: the decision. Approval, a request for evidence, administrative processing, or refusal. A consular refusal under the "further processing" provision is not always final — it often means a document is missing and the case can be completed.

Stage eight, in marriage cases under two years old: conditional residence, with the removal-of-conditions petition due in the ninety days before the second anniversary.

The documents, and where people lose months

Civil documents cause more delay than any legal issue in an ordinary case.

Birth certificates. Long-form, showing both parents. Where a country's records are unavailable or unreliable, the State Department publishes reciprocity information stating what is obtainable — and where a document is genuinely unavailable, secondary evidence with a certification of unavailability is the substitute: baptismal records, school records, census records, and affidavits from people with personal knowledge of the birth.

Marriage certificates, and proof of termination of every prior marriage for both spouses — final divorce decrees, annulment orders, or death certificates. Missing prior-divorce documentation is a top cause of delay, and it is entirely avoidable.

Police certificates for consular cases, from every country where the applicant has lived for a specified period since a specified age. These expire, and obtaining them from some countries takes months.

Court and prison records for any arrest, anywhere, regardless of outcome.

Military records where applicable.

Passports valid well beyond the anticipated entry date.

Translations — every foreign-language document needs a complete English translation with a certification of accuracy signed by the translator.

The sequencing lesson: order the documents that take longest — foreign birth certificates, police certificates, foreign court records — at the start of the process, not when the interview is scheduled. A case that is otherwise ready can sit for six months waiting on one certificate from one country.

Special protections worth knowing about

Self-petitions for survivors of abuse. A spouse, child, or parent who has been subjected to battery or extreme cruelty by a U.S. citizen or permanent resident family member may self-petition — without the abuser's knowledge, participation, or consent.

This is one of the most important provisions in family immigration law, and it exists precisely because the ordinary structure gives the petitioner control over the beneficiary's status, which is a form of leverage that has been used badly.

What it requires: the qualifying relationship, residence with the abuser, the battery or extreme cruelty, good faith in the marriage where applicable, and good moral character. Confidentiality protections apply to these filings.

Widows and widowers. The surviving spouse of a U.S. citizen may self-petition within a defined period after the death, regardless of how long the marriage lasted, and a pending petition converts automatically on the citizen's death.

Humanitarian reinstatement. Where the petitioner dies after a petition is approved but before the case is completed, the approval can sometimes be reinstated for humanitarian reasons, or a substitute sponsor may take over the affidavit of support.

Children who cannot be reunified with a parent because of abuse, abandonment, or neglect may qualify for special immigrant juvenile classification, which requires a state juvenile court order making specific findings — a process that runs through family court before it reaches immigration.

Fiancé(e) petitions offer a different route for a citizen's intended spouse abroad: entry on a fiancé(e) visa, marriage within ninety days, then adjustment of status. The ninety days is absolute, and failing to marry within it creates a serious problem.

Each of these has requirements a summary cannot capture. They are listed here so that a person in one of these situations knows the provision exists and asks about it by name.

What to do while you wait

In the long categories, the wait is most of the case. Use it.

Keep the priority date safe. Keep the receipt and approval notices. Photograph them. Store copies in more than one place.

Report address changes to the agency and to the National Visa Center. Missed notices in a case that has been pending twelve years are heartbreaking and common.

Watch for events that change the category. A petitioner's naturalization. A beneficiary's marriage or divorce. A child turning 21. Each of these can convert, accelerate, or destroy a case — and some of them can be timed.

If the petitioner naturalizes, notify the agency, because the conversion is not always automatic in every configuration and the case should be updated.

Build the admissibility file early. If there is any criminal history, any prior removal, any period of unlawful presence, any prior immigration application, or any question about a statement made on any form — get the analysis done now, while there is time to obtain records, build a waiver, and plan. The worst version of this process is discovering a permanent bar eleven years into a twelve-year wait.

Keep relationship evidence current in marriage and parent-child cases. Documents that show a continuous relationship over years are far more persuasive than documents assembled the month before an interview.

Keep tax filings clean, for the petitioner and the immigrant both. The affidavit of support runs on tax records.

And revisit the plan every few years. Categories move, laws change, and a family's circumstances change. A case filed in 2012 may have options in 2026 that did not exist when it was filed.

Choosing help, and avoiding the industry that preys on this

Immigration is the legal field with the largest gap between the stakes and the quality of available help, and the reason is that the people who need it most are the least able to evaluate it.

Who can represent you: a licensed attorney, or a representative accredited by the Department of Justice to practice before the immigration agencies through a recognized organization. Those are the two categories. There is no third.

"Notario público" means something different in many Latin American countries — a legal professional with substantial authority. In the United States, a notary public witnesses signatures. The mistranslation has been used to defraud immigrant families for decades, and the damage is often permanent: applications filed in the wrong category, false statements entered on forms the applicant never read, cases abandoned when the preparer disappears, and — worst — filings that create bars where none existed.

Warning signs, every one of which is disqualifying:

Guarantees a result
Tells you to answer a question inaccurately, or leaves a question blank without explaining why
Will not give you copies of what was filed
Asks you to sign a blank form
Charges for government forms, which are free
Will not give a bar number or accreditation you can verify
Claims a special relationship with an officer or a consulate
Advises you to depart the country without discussing the unlawful presence bars

Where to find real help:

Nonprofit organizations with accredited representatives, listed by the Department of Justice. Many charge little or nothing.

Law school immigration clinics.

Bar association referral services, which screen for licensure.

And verify the person you hire. Every state bar publishes a searchable directory of licensed attorneys and their disciplinary history. Every accredited representative appears on a published list. Checking takes five minutes and prevents the most common catastrophe in this field.

One more thing, said plainly: if a prior preparer filed something inaccurate in your name, that is a problem you need a lawyer to address, not a problem to hide. A misrepresentation in a prior filing is a ground of inadmissibility with a waiver; the same misrepresentation repeated under oath at an interview is far worse. Bring the file to a real lawyer and deal with it before the interview.

Frequently asked questions

My petition was approved. When do I get the green card? Approval establishes the relationship, not visa availability. If you are an immediate relative, you can proceed now. In a preference category, you wait for your priority date.

Should I file even though the wait is twenty years? Yes. The priority date starts when you file. Waiting does not shorten the line.

Can a green card holder petition for a parent or a sibling? No. Only citizens can. This is a real reason to naturalize.

My child is about to turn 21. Check the Child Status Protection Act calculation, and act within one year of visa availability — that requirement is where protection is lost.

Can I adjust status inside the country? Generally you need a lawful entry, and usually maintained status — with a major exception for immediate relatives on the status question. Entry without inspection is the usual obstacle.

Is it dangerous to leave for a consular interview? It can be. Departure triggers the unlawful presence bars. Get the analysis before booking anything.

What is a provisional waiver? A way to apply for a waiver of the unlawful presence bar before departing, so you know the answer before you leave. It requires extreme hardship to a qualifying relative.

What if I once said I was a U.S. citizen? Get advice immediately. A false claim to citizenship is among the harshest grounds in the statute and generally has no waiver.

How binding is the affidavit of support? Fully. It survives divorce and is enforceable by the government and by the immigrant.

We divorced during conditional residence. File the petition to remove conditions with a waiver of the joint filing requirement, on good faith, hardship, or abuse. Do not simply let the deadline pass.