The dreaded DS-5535 thread for Montreal. Post here and support each other (split)

[Mary184 5]

On 6/3/2022 at 4:49 PM, LAMA9 said:

Hi @Bill22- welcome.

not sure if you read the above posts but there is a WOM group suit webinar tomorrow if you are interested.  I will DM you the info.  Hacking Law and Goldstein Law seem to be the most popular on these sights for WOM, but many, many lawyers do them.  I had reached out to Hacking last week and they wouldn't take a K1 DS-5535 at this time, but not sure of your case specifics.  

 

A few people on here are using Josh Goldstein right now - I have my second call with them tonight.  

 

 

Hi, was this webinar recorded? Is there a link I can watch as I just saw there was such webinar. Thanks 

[OceanWater 60]

3 hours ago, Mary184 said:

May I ask who you filed it with? Thank you 

Goldstein. Would recommend.

 

3 hours ago, Mary184 said:

Hi guys, Does Goldstein team has an free strategy session to evaluate if a case is qualified for filing WOM? Thanks 

Yes, you have two meetings prior to signing and filing.

[LAMA9 118]

12 hours ago, Mary184 said:

Hi guys, Does Goldstein team has an free strategy session to evaluate if a case is qualified for filing WOM? Thanks 

 

12 hours ago, Mary184 said:

May I ask who you filed it with? Thank you 

 

12 hours ago, Mary184 said:

Is there anyone here with Canadian citizenship who was born in Iran? How long did it take you to get clearance after receiving the form DS5355? Thanks a lot in advance for your help 

Hi @Mary184.  Welcome to the group.  We are sorry you have to join us here.  When was you interview?  I am pretty sure we are all Canadian citizens here on this thread, or the majority at least and we have all been waiting various lengths of time since submitting our DS-5535 back to the consulate.  You can check out the identified cases on this spreadsheet.:  https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GySrwbar5E0dzY4DCJ8s0eagm1up6TxedDBTPYiOlJw/edit#gid=1745669763.  There has not been an approval since April 5 and that was with a WOM suit.   Most of us, if not all who are in the process of filing a WOM, are going with Josh Goldstein: https://jgoldlaw.com/ and yes, they do offer a free 15 min consultation (not with a lawyer) to collect information on your case, then they take it back to their lawyers and let you know if they will take you on as a client.  I suggest filling out the consultation request form on their website and include as much information and attachments as possible before your 15 min meeting so they have everything in advance.  They will ask you for anything additional they need to make a decision on whether or not you qualify for a WOM.

[LAMA9 118]

12 hours ago, Mary184 said:

Hi, was this webinar recorded? Is there a link I can watch as I just saw there was such webinar. Thanks 

Hi @Mary184 I just DM'd you the link to the video recording.  While I don't believe anyone here is going with these particular lawyers or participating in a group WOM suit, there is still some valuable information in here regarding how WOM suits work.  Let me know if you have any trouble accessing it.  

[Mary184 5]

17 minutes ago, LAMA9 said:

 

 

Hi @Mary184.  Welcome to the group.  We are sorry you have to join us here.  When was you interview?  I am pretty sure we are all Canadian citizens here on this thread, or the majority at least and we have all been waiting various lengths of time since submitting our DS-5535 back to the consulate.  You can check out the identified cases on this spreadsheet.:  https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GySrwbar5E0dzY4DCJ8s0eagm1up6TxedDBTPYiOlJw/edit#gid=1745669763.  There has not been an approval since April 5 and that was with a WOM suit.   Most of us, if not all who are in the process of filing a WOM, are going with Josh Goldstein: https://jgoldlaw.com/ and yes, they do offer a free 15 min consultation (not with a lawyer) to collect information on your case, then they take it back to their lawyers and let you know if they will take you on as a client.  I suggest filling out the consultation request form on their website and include as much information and attachments as possible before your 15 min meeting so they have everything in advance.  They will ask you for anything additional they need to make a decision on whether or not you qualify for a WOM.

Hi @LAMA9, thank you so much for the response. I’m also Canadian citizen, but with Iranian background. My I-140 was approved long time ago, I have to find the date but roughly  in summer 2019, I had applied early 2019. Then I was waiting for IVP and didn’t hear back, then Covid happened and I didn’t hear anything back. Then I went to interview in May and was out in DS 5355 path. So from the beginning to now, it’s been a few year now that we are sitting and waiting! I’ve lost several job opportunities, all my dream job which I worked so hard to get the offers, because of all the stops in this process. As everyone else I’m very frustrated and have no clue what to do. I was thinking the reason I’m going through DS 5355 is the Iranian background. However, I know several Iranians that just moved to US with absolutely no issue. One of them was not even Canadian citizen, they gave work permit very easily. Another one got a job offer from US government and visa process was quick and easy. So I can’t understand what the reason is and how I can help resolving it. I had an attorney from the beginning of this process, but even the attorney doesn’t seem to be able to get an answer. Sorry for long post, I don’t know where else I can get any clue or help … 

[From_CAN_2_US 1,106]

31 minutes ago, Mary184 said:

Hi @LAMA9, thank you so much for the response. I’m also Canadian citizen, but with Iranian background. My I-140 was approved long time ago, I have to find the date but roughly  in summer 2019, I had applied early 2019. Then I was waiting for IVP and didn’t hear back, then Covid happened and I didn’t hear anything back. Then I went to interview in May and was out in DS 5355 path. So from the beginning to now, it’s been a few year now that we are sitting and waiting! I’ve lost several job opportunities, all my dream job which I worked so hard to get the offers, because of all the stops in this process. As everyone else I’m very frustrated and have no clue what to do. I was thinking the reason I’m going through DS 5355 is the Iranian background. However, I know several Iranians that just moved to US with absolutely no issue. One of them was not even Canadian citizen, they gave work permit very easily. Another one got a job offer from US government and visa process was quick and easy. So I can’t understand what the reason is and how I can help resolving it. I had an attorney from the beginning of this process, but even the attorney doesn’t seem to be able to get an answer. Sorry for long post, I don’t know where else I can get any clue or help … 

It sounds like you are EB category.

 

No one really knows the precise reason DS-5535s are issued. My understanding is the computer reviews your profile among various parameters against a database of persons suspected of being a threat to national security. Any one parameter in itself does not trigger the DS-5535; so simply being from Iran isn’t necessarily sufficient, but that and/ or having education/ employment in certain fields, along with a name/ photo matching with the database would trigger DS-5535 to be issued.

 

I personally believe that Canada has recently been added to the list of high risk countries possibly because of intelligence of security threats originating in Canada. This is speculation but explains why Canadian citizens are targetted at a higher percentage than other Low risk countries since October 2021.

[ice-qube 648]

3 hours ago, From_CAN_2_US said:

It sounds like you are EB category.

 

No one really knows the precise reason DS-5535s are issued. My understanding is the computer reviews your profile among various parameters against a database of persons suspected of being a threat to national security. Any one parameter in itself does not trigger the DS-5535; so simply being from Iran isn’t necessarily sufficient, but that and/ or having education/ employment in certain fields, along with a name/ photo matching with the database would trigger DS-5535 to be issued.

 

I personally believe that Canada has recently been added to the list of high risk countries possibly because of intelligence of security threats originating in Canada. This is speculation but explains why Canadian citizens are targetted at a higher percentage than other Low risk countries since October 2021.

Lol, provided this is true, I continue to be amazed that any combination of parameters in my case would have triggered a DS-5535. It is literally absurd.

[ice-qube 648]

I wish you all luck on your WOMs. Despite ruminating about this for weeks, I personally cannot bring myself to go through the expense of litigation at this time. I envy you all that you have the free resources to do that. It is deeply embittering that I, with no known risk factors, should be in this position 3 years after applying for a spousal visa. Nonetheless, I just cannot justify the expense of WOM, nor to reconcile the principle of having to do it. I would rather revise my strategy and find a job that allows me to work remote from other countries (I am remote at my current job, but they unhelpfully only let me work remote within Canada), so that I can visit my wife for long stretches. Perhaps in the future I will be able to stomach the filing of WOM, but right now, the idea of throwing several thousand dollars to a third party just to get the consulate to do its job--and that all of you are put in that position, too-- is making me even more bitter.

[BatmanFlow 481]

17 minutes ago, ice-qube said:

Lol, provided this is true, I continue to be amazed that any combination of parameters in my case would have triggered a DS-5535. It is literally absurd.

You were too icy for them 

[ice-qube 648]

15 minutes ago, BatmanFlow said:

You were too icy for them 

It's literally as good a hypothesis as any, amigo.

[From_CAN_2_US 1,106]

1 hour ago, ice-qube said:

Lol, provided this is true, I continue to be amazed that any combination of parameters in my case would have triggered a DS-5535. It is literally absurd.

All it could take is name (similar to some person they suspect) + country. Canada being the latter.

 

I understand that you don’t have a name that is commonly thought to be associated with terrorism (like my Muslim name for example), but from what we are seeing, US intelligence is recently taking alternative right, white nationalist threats very seriously, especially since Jan 6. We also know there is support for such “activism” among the fringe right in Canada. Many, if not most of these people, have very white names. So there maybe several white names on the database.

Edited June 23, 2022 by From_CAN_2_US

[ice-qube 648]

2 minutes ago, From_CAN_2_US said:

All it could take is name (similar to some person they suspect) + country. Canada being the latter.

 

I understand that you don’t have a name that is commonly thought to be associated with terrorism (like my Muslim name for example), but from what we are seeing, US intelligence is taking alternative right, white nationalist threats very seriously, especially since Jan 6. We also know there is support for such “activism” among the fringe right in Canada. Many, if not most of these people, have very white names. So there maybe several white names on the database.

True--but extremely unlikely to have my name which is not common. In addition to that, I am Jewish, and I am very far from having any association with these sorts of people...

[Bob30 2]

49 minutes ago, ice-qube said:

I wish you all luck on your WOMs. Despite ruminating about this for weeks, I personally cannot bring myself to go through the expense of litigation at this time. I envy you all that you have the free resources to do that. It is deeply embittering that I, with no known risk factors, should be in this position 3 years after applying for a spousal visa. Nonetheless, I just cannot justify the expense of WOM, nor to reconcile the principle of having to do it. I would rather revise my strategy and find a job that allows me to work remote from other countries (I am remote at my current job, but they unhelpfully only let me work remote within Canada), so that I can visit my wife for long stretches. Perhaps in the future I will be able to stomach the filing of WOM, but right now, the idea of throwing several thousand dollars to a third party just to get the consulate to do its job--and that all of you are put in that position, too-- is making me even more bitter.

I thought of doing joining the job remotely till this gets sorted. It turns out that we cannot 

 

All U.S. employees must complete the I-9 verification process to work in the U.S.

[ice-qube 648]

12 minutes ago, Bob30 said:

I thought of doing joining the job remotely till this gets sorted. It turns out that we cannot 

 

All U.S. employees must complete the I-9 verification process to work in the U.S.

Not talking about a US job. Just a Canadian job and take laptop and work remote for a couple of weeks at a time while visiting.

[From_CAN_2_US 1,106]

48 minutes ago, ice-qube said:

True--but extremely unlikely to have my name which is not common. In addition to that, I am Jewish, and I am very far from having any association with these sorts of people...

I see. Yeah Jewish people and alt right are pretty much mutually exclusive, I would think…

 

My apologies if I came across accusatory in any way, I never meant to say you were associated with these alt right groups. But that there is the saddest part, you can be targetted while being 100% innocent, like everyone here on this thread.