Showing Intent to Re-establish Domicile

[Safarjal 3]

I'm creating this thread to share my experience with showing Intent to Re-establish Domicile. I'm hoping other people with similar cases can also share their experience and help others.

The Sponsor of an Immigrant for i864 needs to be either,

1. Domiciled in the United States, or
2. Show Proof of Re-establishment of Domicile in the United States, or
3. Show Proof of Intent to Re-establish Domicile in the United States.

As is obvious, number 1 is better than number 2, and both are better than number 3. I went for number 3, as I did not want to be separated from my husband and son for the amount of time it would take to Re-establish Domicile.

My story:

I'm a US citizen by birth, as both my parents were citizens. My parents moved to Pakistan when I was 4 years old. I haven't been back to the states since then. After my marriage, I wanted to settle in the US with my husband and son. So we filed for Immigration Visas for both of them.

My son is not automatically a US citizen from birth, as he has only 1 US citizen parent who has not lived in the US "for a period of at least five years at some time in his or her life prior to the birth, of which at least two years were after his or her 14th birthday." That means that we needed to apply for a visa for him too, though he doesn't need an Affidavit of Support, (but instead a Form I-864W), and becomes a citizen upon entry into the US by an Immigration Visa.

As I haven't filed any US taxes, and do not have US based income anyway, we needed a joint sponsor for my husband. Luckily, one of our relatives was willing to sponsor.

Even so I needed to show Proof of Intent to Re-establish Domicile. These are the thing we gathered:

1. An invitation letter to stay with a family member indefinitely.
2. An Enrollment Agreement for my son in a Pre-school near her house.
3. We opened a bank account, and transferred funds there. We used a bank statement as proof of this.
4. My husband obtained a job invitation letter from a US based company. As I am a stay-at-home-parent to my 2 year old son, we explained that my husband was going to be the principle breadwinner for the family.
5. I already had a Social Security Number

Luckily these documents were sufficient, and our visa was approved.

We gathered all these documents without leaving Pakistan, with the help of some family members abroad. More about how to do that in the next post.

[Safarjal 3]

For the Pre-school/Daycare Enrollment agreement:

I googled Daycares near *zipcode of family member's address*. Then I got their email addresses from their websites. I composed an email, essentially:

Hello,

I'm planning to move to the US soon, with my son, and I would like to enroll my son, XXX (age x years) at your daycare. As I'm currently living abroad, I can't personally come in to fill out any documents, but if you mail them to me, I can mail you back the completed forms along with any enrollment fees. Is it possible for you to enroll my son in your daycare?

XXX

and emailed it to all the email addresses. One place replied yes, and emailed me scans of their enrollment form. I completed the form and emailed a scan of it to them, along with the enrollment fee. They signed the agreement after receiving the fee, and scanned me a copy, which I printed and showed at the interview.

[Safarjal 3]

Opening a US bank account from abroad:

Opening the bank account was tricky. We tried opening an account online, as many US banks allow that but ran into two problems. One was that most banks required two id documents to open an account online: A driver's license/State id and a Social Security number. I didn't have the first, though I did have the second. While some few banks would accept a US Passport as id document along with a Social Security Number, we ran into the second problem. As I had left the US as a very young child, the online account opening system, which searches for an applicant's history in the US, was not able to find that I existed, and so would not open an account for me.

The next thing we tried was contacting US citizen relatives for help. A relative talked to his bank, which agreed to open an account for us. They sent us the papers we need to fill out to get an account. As my signature on the papers needed to be notarized, they asked me to take it to the US consulate in Islamabad, Pakistan to use their notarial services. We got the forms filled out, notarized and then mailed them to the bank. Since then, I have used online banking with that bank account.

Other US citizen, and even non citizen relatives have successfully opened US bank accounts from abroad in SRI Federal Credit Union. They will accept even non-US passports as id documents, and non US addresses. The catch is that in order to open an account there, you need to either be a direct relative (child, parent or sibling) of an account holder, or be a student or member of faculty at a select few universities in California. We did not open our account there because I had no direct relative with an account in that bank, at the time.

[Safarjal 3]

Our lawyer advised us, that even if we were not able to open a bank account or other proof of intent to reestablish domicile, we should print out detailed rejection emails to take with us. Then we can show those to the officer as reason for not being able to open a bank account.

[Safarjal 3]

Lawyers tell you to only and exactly answer the question that you have been asked, and offer no further details or information. My experience is, that it is beneficial to offer extra information,  especially if it looks like the officer is ignoring an important proof or point in your story. In our case, the officer asked where I was currently living. I said, Pakistan. He asked, where in the US. I said, I don't have a residence in the US. He was starting to say: Ma'am, I'm sorry, but ... (I can't approve your visa), when my husband interrupted him to say, that we are planning to move to the US together, and we have proof of intent to re establish domicile. Then he started passing the documents: bank account, social security, preschool registration, job offer letter, invitation from family, etc.

If he had not interrupted, against the lawyer's advice, and offered information that had not been requested, I'm 100% sure that we would have been rejected.

The officer is accepting or rejecting cases based on his own judgement of whether or not the case is genuine or fake. Offering extra details, beyond the bare bones that have been requested, makes the case appear more convincing, imo. Just make sure that the extra details you offer aren't lies.

But maybe the lawyers know better. I am not a lawyer.