N-400 August 2023 Filers

[Maria P. 35]

On 11/24/2023 at 11:43 AM, CuriousImmigrant_ said:

The middle east

 

As a Russian citizen I would say Middle East is not too bad on a scale of "some part of the world which is not favorite to the U.S.".... Name a country that doesn't hate Russians these days...     

 

I am Russian born, but luckily I have dual citizenship with Czech Republic ( abandoned my Russian passport back in 2021) - but even back in time when I once came to USA in 2018 and instead of ESTA on EU passport & showed them my B1/B2 visa in Russian:

~ the border patrol officer looked into his computer, said "wait, don't you have valid ESTA? you have other normal country passport?"

~ I said "yes, I do, but ESTA is valid for 90 days and I need to stay here for longer than that, so I followed advise from US Consulate and made B1/B2 visa into my Russian passport"

~ the guy - literally was "gimme that friendly country passport, take away this enemy worthless <DELETED>" and 'threw' the Russian passport onto the counter, grabbed my Czech one and stamped it instead.

 

I felt mixture of emotions to be fair. On one side I felt berated, because a colour of my passport does not define me as a human being. I am coming to USA to spend <DELETED> loads of money earned in EU, not doing anything illegal or 'stealing jobs'... Literally came on skydiving vacation - to do sport training & jump for charity event to raise funds for local kids (toys for tots). On the other side I felt lucky to have EU passport and appreciating my parents took my out of Russia, because they wanted better future for me. 

 

But damn, that was a sad moment. What if I did not have the opportunity to be born in normal country? or immigrate in 90s... what if I was just a simple human from Russia, or what if I was born in Afghanistan or North Korea -  do I deserve to be called 'enemy worthless' citizen? the dude like doesn't know anything about me. My mum is a doctor, my dad is engineer - I work in consulting and have degree from UK university and studied in Cambridge. I speak fluently several languages. Why on Earth I was considered a piece of , I am not sure... but the look on his face said it all - mixture of disgust, unfriendly, unprofessional, berating.  It was just this one time that I had such experience on the border, but for sure - made a lasting impact in my soul.

 

The morale of the story? I have never experienced anything like that one in Miami airport in 2018 ever again...  Year ago - a border patrol officer even asked me why i don't apply for citizenship and in general I always have a pleasant experience. There are some mean/unprofessional people in the govt. employee field, just like in any work. But not all of them - I would probably say it's outlier. 

I don't believe they would cherry pick/discriminate in USCIS on the basis of a country, I think they are just busy + mistakes happen and I have friends from different countries having similar experience with USCIS. My buddy from New Zealand married to his girlfriend of 18 years (who is USA citizen) - applied for AOS in 2020 and is still waiting.  Friendly part of the world you would expect and 3 years they are waiting. USCIS is just not really the best operating organization on this planet, just have to accept this fact...  Everything will work out buddy)

 

 

Edited November 29, 2023 by TBoneTX
prohibited words removed

[OldUser 6,583]

On 11/24/2023 at 12:15 PM, Maria P. said:

 

As a Russian citizen I would say Middle East is not too bad on a scale of "some part of the world which is not favorite to the U.S.".... Name a country that doesn't hate Russians these days...     

 

I am Russian born, but luckily I have dual citizenship with Czech Republic ( abandoned my Russian passport back in 2021) - but even back in time when I once came to USA in 2018 and instead of ESTA on EU passport & showed them my B1/B2 visa in Russian:

~ the border patrol officer looked into his computer, said "wait, don't you have valid ESTA? you have other normal country passport?"

~ I said "yes, I do, but ESTA is valid for 90 days and I need to stay here for longer than that, so I followed advise from US Consulate and made B1/B2 visa into my Russian passport"

~ the guy - literally was "gimme that friendly country passport, take away this enemy worthless <DELETED>" and 'threw' the Russian passport onto the counter , grabbed my Czech one and stamped it instead.

 

I felt mixture of emotions to be fair. On one side I felt berated, because a colour of my passport does not define me as a human being. I am coming to USA to spend <DELETED> loads of money earned in EU, not doing anything illegal or 'stealing jobs'... Literally came on skydiving vacation - to do sport training & jump for charity event to raise funds for local kids (toys for tots). On the other side I felt lucky to have EU passport and appreciating my parents took my out of Russia, because they wanted better future for me. 

 

But damn, that was a sad moment. What if I did not have the opportunity to be born in normal country? or immigrate in 90s... what if I was just a simple human from Russia, or what if I was born in Afghanistan or North Korea -  do I deserve to be called 'enemy worthless' citizen? the dude like doesn't know anything about me. My mum is a doctor, my dad is engineer - I work in consulting and have degree from UK university and studied in Cambridge. I speak fluently several languages. Why on Earth I was considered a piece of , I am not sure... but the look on his face said it all - mixture of disgust, unfriendly, unprofessional, berating.  It was just this one time that I had such experience on the border, but for sure - made a lasting impact in my soul.

 

The morale of the story? I have never experienced anything like that one in Miami airport in 2018 ever again...  Year ago - a border patrol officer even asked me why i don't apply for citizenship and in general I always have a pleasant experience. There are some mean/unprofessional people in the govt. employee field, just like in any work. But not all of them - I would probably say it's outlier. 

I don't believe they would cherry pick/discriminate in USCIS on the basis of a country, I think they are just busy + mistakes happen and I have friends from different countries having similar experience with USCIS. My buddy from New Zealand married to his girlfriend of 18 years (who is USA citizen) - applied for AOS in 2020 and is still waiting.  Friendly part of the world you would expect and 3 years they are waiting. USCIS is just not really the best operating organization on this planet, just have to accept this fact...  Everything will work out buddy)

Wow, what a story. Thank you for sharing. I think you should consider formally renouncing Russian citizenshjp to avoid any prejudice from CBP / other officials (if you feel like). What a sad world we live in.

Edited November 29, 2023 by TBoneTX
prohibited word removed from quote

[Crazy Cat 41,770]

***One comment and another quoting it edited to remove a TOS violation***

- VJ Moderation

Edited November 24, 2023 by Crazy Cat

[CuriousImmigrant_ 8]

Anyone has luck with submitting FOIA to expediate the processing of the N400? 

[Maria P. 35]

Guys, I am assembling all evidence/copies and new 'top-ups' for bank statements since filing for i751/N400, new photos, etc. Does everything have to be still printed single sided or I can bring extra stuff to interview double-side printed? 

[jmrincon 10]

8 minutes ago, Maria P. said:

Guys, I am assembling all evidence/copies and new 'top-ups' for bank statements since filing for i751/N400, new photos, etc. Does everything have to be still printed single sided or I can bring extra stuff to interview double-side printed? 

 

According to USCIS, everything should be printed one sided: https://www.uscis.gov/forms/filing-guidance/tips-for-filing-forms-by-mail

[JenIE 402]

1 hour ago, jmrincon said:

 

According to USCIS, everything should be printed one sided: https://www.uscis.gov/forms/filing-guidance/tips-for-filing-forms-by-mail

I would do one sided to match what's expected for submissions. 

 

As a note we just had our interview last week and had uploaded everything online at the time of submission and didn't actually bring anything with us except for the official documents listed on the interview letter (green card, marriage license, birth Certificate, etc). They didn't ask to see any documents more recent than what we submitted and they didn't even ask to see the documents we brought since we had already scanned in copies online ahead of time.

 

The interviewer was also impressed we had even included a passport photo which meant my husband didn't need to take a new photo for the Naturalization Certificate.

[Maria P. 35]

6 minutes ago, JenIE said:

I would do one sided to match what's expected for submissions. 

 

As a note we just had our interview last week and had uploaded everything online at the time of submission and didn't actually bring anything with us except for the official documents listed on the interview letter (green card, marriage license, birth Certificate, etc). They didn't ask to see any documents more recent than what we submitted and they didn't even ask to see the documents we brought since we had already scanned in copies online ahead of time.

 

The interviewer was also impressed we had even included a passport photo which meant my husband didn't need to take a new photo for the Naturalization Certificate.

 

I have applied via mail, thus a bit worried,  what if something got lost in transit or I don't know did not get fully scanned? In MyUSCIS online account (in the upload/documents tab) - I see only partially scanned application and supporting evidence (from what was sent via mail), so I decided to just reprint everything in case there was an error of online vs. mail sync, or in case something is lost...  my motto is 'over-prepare' than have 0.1% chance of something going wrong   

 

@JenIE  About the photo - do you think I can bring one to the interview or maybe upload it online even if I mailed the original submission? 

[JenIE 402]

12 minutes ago, Maria P. said:

 

I have applied via mail, thus a bit worried,  what if something got lost in transit or I don't know did not get fully scanned? In MyUSCIS online account (in the upload/documents tab) - I see only partially scanned application and supporting evidence (from what was sent via mail), so I decided to just reprint everything in case there was an error of online vs. mail sync, or in case something is lost...  my motto is 'over-prepare' than have 0.1% chance of something going wrong   

 

@JenIE  About the photo - do you think I can bring one to the interview or maybe upload it online even if I mailed the original submission? 

Ah yeah I can understand the worry if you mailed it! I think you can go back into your case online and upload evidence after the fact? I can't check because they closed our case. 

 

It wasn't a big deal for people needing photos, they had a camera to take them that day for those who were approved. I'm not sure if they need it to be in digital form when they use it.

[aneeth 1]

Has any one attended N-400 Interview in Settle Field office.  

[jmrincon 10]

Another update to Estimated Time Until Case Decision: down to 3 months from 4. 

Still no movement on my i751 either. 

[CuriousImmigrant_ 8]

1 hour ago, jmrincon said:

Another update to Estimated Time Until Case Decision: down to 3 months from 4. 

Still no movement on my i751 either. 

Which FO?

 

I got the same update as well. What I understand is that it is a computer generated number based on an estimate that is based on a large number of people. So that may not be very helpful for individual cases. 

[jmrincon 10]

55 minutes ago, CuriousImmigrant_ said:

Which FO?

 

I got the same update as well. What I understand is that it is a computer generated number based on an estimate that is based on a large number of people. So that may not be very helpful for individual cases. 

 San Francisco 

[DrIdu 50]

Hi all! Mr. Idu’s oath ceremony has been set… finally! Happy to be at this milestone. Will update more once he’s done done.

[IamYourFriend 19]

Had my N400 interview this week. Approved and should receive oath ceremony notice in 2 weeks. Officer at Baltimore field office said no more same-day oath ceremonies. Didn't ask why.

 

Submitted application Aug 20th. Marriage based GC. 3 year anniversary filing. Had a pending I-751 but my spouse was not invited for an interview even though they came into the building with me.