Senator/ congressman contact question

[Jauque 1]

Hey guys,

Question about when should I have a congressman/senator's office call the USCIS for me to check on my I-129F?

Do they have to wait til the wait time (5 months) is expired as well, or can they inquire now??

I just feel like I have been totally skipped over since almost everyone else in March is getting their approvals and we havent even been touched or anything!!

I appreciate the info

Meggie

I'd be reluctant to call this early, boy who cried wolf mentality, you may need them to take you seriously at some point. If it's not been 5 months than generally they won't take you seriously. I've heard of people scheduling info-pass appointments and making a service request a bit earlier that the time frame. (The case I'm thinking of was at 5 months back when the time frame was 6). That has been occasionally successful.

Best of luck to both of you!

[Philosykos 0]

My logic is what will it hurt to call the person within your congress man's office that handles immigration issues and have them make an inquiry?

I'm sure it is just a standard letter sent to the USCIS. It is my understanding that once the USCIS receives a congressional inquiry the USCIS must respond within a short timeframe as to the status of the petition.

It is one way to get their attention quickly.

The willingness to help I would assume just depends on the individual you are talking to.

If they are willing to help and make contact with the USCIS chances are the petition will start being processed...

Not so much.

First of all, you can't just call. They have to have a signed release form from you before they can start making any inquiries.

Next, when the congressman's office inquires, USCIS tells them that they need up to 120 days to respond to any inquiry.

Best of all, if your petition is still within USCIS's "current processing times" (i.e., the time posted on their website that's updated once a month and already 45 days out of date at the time of posting), they won't do a blessed thing. Your file won't even get a touch.

Been there, done that. Unless you have a very good congressman, it's most likely wasted effort.

I wish people would quit presenting their experience as if they were the general truth... I understand your frustration having a useless congressional rep, but it would be better not to infer a general or even probable hopelessness from your own experience. My personal experience is that congressional representatives (or their caseworkers) can do a lot for you if they want to, and others here seem to have that kind of experience as well.

Ours pushed the delayed processing of our petition (o.k., 5.5 months, but at that point VSC had definitely moved on to processing February and March rather than January filers and we had been passed over) to completion. Just for the record, we had a straightforward and completely legitimate case, the only thing special was that I had already studied and worked in the US for years (always legal, and we included the documents proving that in the petition), and we had actually lived together already. I'll admit that whether or not the congresswoman's caseworker helped speed thing up is all speculation, but if nothing else it simply felt good to have someone helping us and to get some real information about the status.

He seemed to be quite invested in helping with immigration issues, he was willing to inquire on a weekly basis from 5 months of waiting on, he knew the people he was talking to at USCIS, and he got calls back within a day giving him real time information about the status of our petition (information that was different from the incorrect information my fiancé had gotten from calling USCIS himself -- something we quickly quit doing once we knew the congressional office was working on it, because -- as we were told by USCIS, who knows if it's true -- once a file has a congressional flag, it's in a different place and to keep calling yourself can actually delay things further). When we were approved and my fiancé called the congresswoman's caseworker to let him know, the first thing he asked was "Shall I give NVC a call to see if they have shipped it to Frankfurt yet?" (which wasn't necessary anymore at that point).

I know there are people who are less fortunate and whose representatives just brush them off with the 6-months rule, and possibly don't even do anything after that. However, it is important to know that they CAN help if they apply themselves to it. I will forever be grateful to ours for doing so. (Moreover, I wouldn't be surprised if the congressional flag on our petition preempted any potential ideas to put us in AP at NVC, but of course that's just speculation as well).

However, I would generally say wait until you see on Igor's List that USCIS is basically done processing petitions that were filed during the same month as yours, and is largely focusing on the next, while you are one of the few left behind. That is the time to get congressional help, no matter what the "official" processing time is.

[Stephen + Elisha 92]

philosykos, your points are well taken.

In the situation you describe, i.e., your petition has been "left behind" while nearly all others filed around the same time have been approved, asking for congressional assistance is a great idea. Based on how response my congressman's office was, I have little doubt that they would have gone to the mat for me had I been in that situation.

My situation was different, however. VSC hadn't started processing my March "cohort" at all, but CSC was over a month ahead and already through most of the March petitions. I was frustrated and willing to try anything to speed things up, but came away empty-handed. I suspect almost anyone who requests congressional assistance in the situation I described will find it as fruitless as I did. USCIS will not expedite you or anything else outside of standard procedure, even in response to a congressional request.

Bottom line, if you have a relatively convincing case that there is a problem with your petition (i.e., left behind), then the congressional route is the way to go. If you're just frustrated with the glacial pace of the service center you're stuck at, going to your congressman isn't going to speed things up. I apologize for overgeneralizing from my experience; I let my frustration with the process get the better of me.

[unknown001 0]

Hey guys,

Question about when should I have a congressman/senator's office call the USCIS for me to check on my I-129F?

Do they have to wait til the wait time (5 months) is expired as well, or can they inquire now??

I just feel like I have been totally skipped over since almost everyone else in March is getting their approvals and we havent even been touched or anything!!

I appreciate the info

Meggie

==============

Yes, You must wait for that deadline to pass before you wants to contact a C/men office. Mine is more than 7 months @ VSC and average time per USCIS is 5 months. So i called C/men office and they are workin on it. Good Luck!!

[NatPatBen 3]

The biggest confusion for me is WHEN you can consider your file to be outside of normal processing times since the USCIS website is six weeks behind reality. So even though I'm now past 5 months without a touch or RFE, when I call I am told I am within normal times because the website says the end of December is still being processed. Which it clearly is not! Any thoughts?

That's the thing. I contacted both senators & congressman when I hit over 5 months. Two told me that my case was within normal processing time right away. One did send an inquiry to USCIS. The response from USCIS to my senator (who mailed it to me) was that my case was within normal processing time.

At the time, the website said that as of April 30, they were on cases from late November. It was early June when they (every government employee I contacted) quoted me that same "November 23" date. I kept trying to explain that if they were on Nov 23 as of April 30, then SURELY they had made it to December 24 by early June. But only one (out of MANY) person ever even recognized the logic...

While I had no results from contacting my senators/congressman, I don't discourage you from contacting yours. I'm sure at least some of them are helpful.

[Kimbear 53]

just as an update..if you look at the march filers for CSC, those of us who felt left behind (as most of april is done, and a few from may have been approved) we contracted our congressman, two of us have had our approval within a week of contacting them. and a couple more have made contact wth congressman as well.

with the recent influx of approvals that seem to be stemmed from congressman pushing USCIS i would definately say it's well worth it. After 142 days of waiting, i'm happily getting all my stuff i need for P3 now as I received my Noa2 one week from contact with our congressman.