USCIS just published the 1st Quarter and no sign of accelerating the backlog of I 751 at all...

[theresaL 408]

32 minutes ago, millefleur said:

There's a LIN I-751 filers that has been started here on VJ:

 

 

Thank you!!!! I thought I had seen one but then couldn't find it later only Missleman's NBC spreadsheet. 

[Cryssiekins 976]

Just now, missileman said:

I have read somewhere that more than 75% of appealed cases are approved......so that pushes that 3% even lower, I guess.

Which, from a legal proceeding standpoint, makes sense, because denying a petition would place the burden of proving the reason for denial (ie. Fraud) onto USCIS.  Would be a tough case to make, I would think, so... essentially, for those who entered their marriage with the 10-year green card at the top of their list, for $680, and 2 years of your life, you can make it

through.  That’s definitely not right.  Immigration reform is definitely needed to weed out fraud at earlier stages, which would actually make things smoother, in my opinion, for everyone who is legitimate later in their process.  

[millefleur 5,047]

12 minutes ago, Cryssiekins said:

Which, from a legal proceeding standpoint, makes sense, because denying a petition would place the burden of proving the reason for denial (ie. Fraud) onto USCIS.  Would be a tough case to make, I would think, so... essentially, for those who entered their marriage with the 10-year green card at the top of their list, for $680, and 2 years of your life, you can make it

through.  That’s definitely not right.  Immigration reform is definitely needed to weed out fraud at earlier stages, which would actually make things smoother, in my opinion, for everyone who is legitimate later in their process.  

I'm just really shocked by how low that denial rate is. I assumed the reason we all had to do ROC was because fraud was rampant with marriage based visas, well, according to that number, it's not. I would've guess at least a 10% denial rate or higher. Either they are just approving everyone willy nilly and just assume the majority of the cases look OK...or the reality is that fraud via marriage visas just isn't that high and they need to shift their fraud catching attention elsewhere.

 

[SalishSea 18,196]

I wonder if priorities in terms of form/petition/application processing gets changed in any sort of cyclic manner, relating to the actual numbers.  For example, last year at this time our I-129f petition took 185 days to be approved (no RFEs), and that was considered "good."  This year, I have noticed non-expedited petitions being approved months faster than that.  I wouldn't think that the number of received petitions would have changed so dramatically, so perhaps the change is their focus?

[Crazy Cat 42,535]

18 minutes ago, millefleur said:

I'm just really shocked by how low that denial rate is.

Yep.  I just went back checked my own figures......for 1st Qtr FY 2019

Approved: 42,301

Denied: 1287

So, total adjudicated : 43,588

1287/43588= 2.95%   

 

If you assume that all the denials are appealed and 75% are successful, then that pushes the total approved to 43,266

Final approval rate: 99.26%  if my figures are correct.

 

 

Edited April 23, 2019 by missileman

[xillini 71]

36 minutes ago, missileman said:

I have read somewhere that more than 75% of appealed cases are approved......so that pushes that 3% even lower, I guess.

I think that denial number includes for those applications submitted too early (i.e if I 751windows open tomorrow it is delivered today and USCIS just denied it)

 

So being that said it will be even less when it comes to real denials that we think about (i.e real fraud) 

 

Correct so the theory of I 751 works great only in theory but in reality it doesn't help to find marriage fraud.

 

Additionally definition of marriage fraud differs depending on where you live. For instance, the court 9th court district interprets marriage fraud as enter marriage "to evade immigration regulations" while other districts like 5th court district interprets as "entered marriage in good faith"

 

It sounds very similar but testing of "evade immigration regulations" gives more flexibility. For instance you are in H1B and you married with USC. Later USCIS determines your marriage was not a good faith marriage by rejecting I 751 and bring the case to the court upon your request for due process. 

 

Then your defense logic would be something like.. "Oh well i was on H1B and my employer even intended me to sponsor my green card thru employment" and "therefore i did not enter marriage to evade immigration but because of love". Therefore the court is more likely to reject the null hypothesis that the defendant (you) is innocent and therefore more likely to approve your case

 

However if you live in deep south and red states, where they determine your bona fide marriage with good faith, any text message that you flirted with others can backfire when USCIS has access to it. You will put into questions of why you did not comingle finance. You will put into questions for why you didn't plan to travel together for summer with spouse. 

 

So yes definition of sham marriage differs and therefore it really changes the outcome

 

Being that said USCIS uses "good faith marriage" since this test is more stringent and vigorous to verify your marriage.

 

This means that if USCIS rejects the I 751 and put into deportation proceedings, the rate that the immigration will be removed will be even less since some states use more Liberal tests like "evade immigration regulations"

 

 

[SalishSea 18,196]

3 minutes ago, xillini said:

However if you live in deep south and red states, where they determine your bona fide marriage with good faith, any text message that you flirted with others can backfire when USCIS has access to it. You will put into questions of why you did not comingle finance. You will put into questions for why you didn't plan to travel together for summer with spouse. 

You're saying USCIS applies different law in different states?

[Crazy Cat 42,535]

The numbers for 1st Quarter FY 2019 clearly show that Removal of Conditions is wasted effort.....I think we should start a campaign to eliminate it completely......

[xillini 71]

5 minutes ago, Jorgedig said:

You're saying USCIS applies different law in different states?

No

 

USCIS uses "good faith marriage" to determine the bona fide nature of marriage but an immigrants claims due processs upon adversarial action decided by executive branch such as USCIS. 

 

But like any other democracy US has check and balance principle where the court reserves ultimate right to interpret the laws. And depending on the district court, the interpretation may be different stated above.

 

Thats why liberal groups always bring case to 9th district located in CA (such as Trump's travel ban) and conservative groups always bring the case to 5th district located in TX (such as DACA) so that the court district best represent their best interests. 

 

According to Trump, it's called judge shopping. 

Edited April 23, 2019 by xillini

[SalishSea 18,196]

1 minute ago, xillini said:

No

 

USCIS uses "good faith marriage" to determine the bona fide nature of marriage but an immigrants claims due processs upon adversarial action decided by executive branch such as USCIS. 

 

But like any other democracy US has check and balance principle where the court reserves ultimate right to interpret the laws. And depending on the district court, the interpretation may be different stated above

Ah, I see now what you mean.

[millefleur 5,047]

5 minutes ago, missileman said:

The numbers for 1st Quarter FY 2019 clearly show that Removal of Conditions is wasted effort.....I think we should start a campaign to eliminate it completely......

Totally agree. It's not like it would result in job loss either, just focus the fraud finding effort on other areas and visa types instead of wasting on marriage based visas where fraud numbers are so incredibly low. Retrain the staff to handle other types of fraud finding cases, or move them to local USCIS offices. A lot could be done here.

 

Also, and this is probably a hugely unpopular opinion but....pull the plug on allowing people to ROC after divorce. Few countries actually allow that, why do we? Not even the UK gives indefinite leave to remain to folks merely because they entered via marriage to a UK citizen. The US is just too generous sometimes....really. Now let me hide because this opinion will probably rile up some folks here... 

[Shiran 1,134]

1 hour ago, missileman said:

Great analysis, and logically presented.......they could eliminate the ROC requirement  and redirect that effort elsewhere......

Wouldn't that also mean decrease in revenue since those are $680 a pop? Unless they tuck it onto N-400.

[AstroCanada 206]

2 hours ago, millefleur said:

I'm beginning to feel more and more that the whole ROC process is pointless. Think of the amount of time and energy it takes to capture that 3% of denials, who can appeal anyway so maybe some of them are legit and just botched the application or interview, versus all the other fraudulent cases running rampant out there on other types of visas. I'm also pretty sure plenty of fraudsters made it past the 2 year marriage mark just to get that 10 year GC...2 years is honestly peanuts for a marriage, it seems so arbitrary to me that they picked that number. Ranting here, sorry...it just frustrating sometimes especially when you see how low that denial rate is.

Canada actually eliminated their parallel process for removal of conditions a couple years ago:

https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/news/notices/elminating-conditional-pr.html

[AstroCanada 206]

55 minutes ago, xillini said:

Then your defense logic would be something like.. "Oh well i was on H1B and my employer even intended me to sponsor my green card thru employment" and "therefore i did not enter marriage to evade immigration but because of love". Therefore the court is more likely to reject the null hypothesis that the defendant (you) is innocent and therefore more likely to approve your case

I love that you mention the null hypothesis on VJ

[theresaL 408]

45 minutes ago, millefleur said:

Totally agree. It's not like it would result in job loss either, just focus the fraud finding effort on other areas and visa types instead of wasting on marriage based visas where fraud numbers are so incredibly low. Retrain the staff to handle other types of fraud finding cases, or move them to local USCIS offices. A lot could be done here.

 

Also, and this is probably a hugely unpopular opinion but....pull the plug on allowing people to ROC after divorce. Few countries actually allow that, why do we? Not even the UK gives indefinite leave to remain to folks merely because they entered via marriage to a UK citizen. The US is just too generous sometimes....really. Now let me hide because this opinion will probably rile up some folks here... 

It would probably increase the VAWA claims too if divorce is eliminated as an extenuating circumstance. Unless of course VAWA is eliminated too. Personally, I think AOS in country should be eliminated for B visas and a return to their home country to wait out the CR1 required. They need to fulfill the terms of the original visa before being considered for AOS. Is there space to go into hiding with you?? I think I may need to.

Edited April 23, 2019 by theresaL