Permanent Resident Married to L1A Visa Holder

[Mattgirdlestone 0]

Hi there,

I am new to this forum so hopefully posting in the right place.

As the topic title says, I am an L1A Visa Holder with about 1.5 years left on my current visa. I am married to a Permanent Resident for the past 3.5 years and we have two sons (one born in the UK in 2008 who is also a PR and one born in 2010 in San Francisco so is a US Citizen). We want to make our life in the US so are looking at all of our options for changing my status from L1 to Permanent Resident. A friend recommended this site so I thought I would post to see what people think we should do.

My wife is planning to re-apply for citizenship early next year (she was denied citizenship a couple of years ago as her number of days in the US over the previous 5 years was not 50% of that time - she has been a PR for over 15 years). Are we better to wait until she is a citizen before applying for me or should we move ahead with this now and then adjust her status when she gets her citizenship?

As I am already present in the US with a valid work visa, would I be able to get a work permit right away or would I still have to wait for a visa number to come up as a spouse of a PR? It all seems confusing to us right now and we are planning to take some legal advise as well but wanted to see what other peoples experiences have been or if anyone had a similar scenario to the one I have hopefully just explained.

Look forward to any responses

Thanks

MattGirdlestone

[Boiler 46,122]

File now as a PR and upgrade when Citizenship comes.

You will need a visa number to become current before you can file and get an EAD.

[chillab 0]

Hi Matt,

Boiler is right, your wife should file the I-130 petition as LPR for you now. Yes, you would still have to wait for visa to become available than adjust status and get EAD.With the latest processing moving in USCIS and Visa builetin updates it seems reasonable to file now - seems they move much-much quicker than a year ago. I am in similar situation as yours and this is a great site to search for info from the other treads. I am a LPR and will be filling for my citizenship next year, but we've sent our I-130 3 weeks ago.

best,

chillab