Long Stay Out of US on Advance Parole

[Lattimore 1]

My wife was just given her combined employee authorization/advance parole card. Our lawyer is saying it looks like we may have another 7 month wait before the interview, and due to various circumstances with my wife's family the two of us are planning on traveling back to her home country of China for a long stay (we'll both be there together). Our lawyer, who has been great so far, told us that for our situation we should be fine to stay up to 5 months out of the US. The lawyer indicated 5 months was the maximum she'd be comfortable with, and I have a feeling her reasoning was to give a 1 month buffer between us and the 6 month mark that might indicate we'd abandoned residence in the US.

I'm just curious if anyone has any first or secondhand information that would contradict this advice from our lawyer? Her advice seems good to me, and the way I look at it, if the longer stay only moves us from a 1% chance of having a problem at the border to a 2% chance, then we just won't over worry this. On the other hand, if anyone out there has been told by a border official that they stayed too long out of country on an advance parole for a length of stay similar to ours, I'd certainly appreciate hearing about it, as perhaps we would shorten our stay (if her family's circumstances allow for this).

Thank you for any and all advice!

[Georgia16 2,858]

My wife was just given her combined employee authorization/advance parole card. Our lawyer is saying it looks like we may have another 7 month wait before the interview, and due to various circumstances with my wife's family the two of us are planning on traveling back to her home country of China for a long stay (we'll both be there together). Our lawyer, who has been great so far, told us that for our situation we should be fine to stay up to 5 months out of the US. The lawyer indicated 5 months was the maximum she'd be comfortable with, and I have a feeling her reasoning was to give a 1 month buffer between us and the 6 month mark that might indicate we'd abandoned residence in the US.

I'm just curious if anyone has any first or secondhand information that would contradict this advice from our lawyer? Her advice seems good to me, and the way I look at it, if the longer stay only moves us from a 1% chance of having a problem at the border to a 2% chance, then we just won't over worry this. On the other hand, if anyone out there has been told by a border official that they stayed too long out of country on an advance parole for a length of stay similar to ours, I'd certainly appreciate hearing about it, as perhaps we would shorten our stay (if her family's circumstances allow for this).

Thank you for any and all advice!

Your lawyer can't know that??

There is some kind of permission you can get to be out of the country for a longer period but I don't know if you have to have the Green Card first.

[Hypnos 6,578]

There is no hard rule when it comes to time outside of the US on AP. I would say 6 months as a maximum is probably a good estimate, and your lawyer is rightly being conservative and saying 5. The more time you spend outside the US, the more questions you may have to answer with regards to are you actually intending to remain in the US or not, since you are voluntarily choosing to be elsewhere.

[Lattimore 1]

There is no hard rule when it comes to time outside of the US on AP. I would say 6 months as a maximum is probably a good estimate, and your lawyer is rightly being conservative and saying 5. The more time you spend outside the US, the more questions you may have to answer with regards to are you actually intending to remain in the US or not, since you are voluntarily choosing to be elsewhere.

Thanks, that's pretty much my thinking as well. If anyone else has had a different experience please do let me know, as I would think about changing our plans if there are concrete examples of people being denied entrance in circumstances similar to ours.