Stein

In my 55 years I have never, ever been called for jury duty.

It is, and not something I had considered.

No, but the only people that care are those that are filing ROC. That specifically is why I posted it there and even mentioned that in the OP.

I didn't want to call out anyone specifically but a couple of responses said they didn't want to, not that they couldn't. That is what made me think about it.

I didn't want to derail the 48 month extension letter thread but I don't want to move this to the N-400 forum as the people that would answer this question would be reading here and wouldn't be reading there. Of course every person's situation is different but why would a US immigrant NOT want to file for citizenship? I'm truly curious. Other than those that simply can't hold dual citizenship I can see several advantages above being a LPR. I'm curious what people see as disadvantages. At least for me personally, I see several advantages: No more green card renewals which saves money and paperwork. Can't forget to file which could creep up on you on a 10 year card as it's such a long time. Spouse would potentially get more SS benefits as a widow than working and earning the beneficiary's own. In my case my wife would never reach my level of benefit even when it is 50% of mine as I'm capped at the SS max benefit. She won't even work 40 quarters to get any on her own if we move back to her country, which is probably going to happen before 10 years. Potentially getting a more powerful passport. This might not be the case coming from Europe but coming from SE Asia my wife's passport is weak trying to get to many countries but the benefit of visa-free travel to many SE Asia countries so she could use hers sometime and US sometime. But if you hold dual citizenship this may not be a benefit but wouldn't be a negative. No risk of loosing a green card if you spend most of your time outside the US, again, as we plan to do in the future. To be able to come back any time you want even after a multi-year stay outside the US is reassuring. Again, for me, zero disadvantages because my wife will also keep her VN passport and citizenship. We would still have to file iincome taxes in the US based on worldwide income anyway so, while it isn't a benefit, it isn't a negative either.

You might be one of the first people getting a 48 month extension letter.

For the few that wouldn't want citizenship if you could always file for the N-400, get schedule for the combo interview, then go to the I-751 interview which needs to be done first and then "fail" the civics test and not re-schedule taking the test again. I-751 gest done and you still don't have citizenship. It would cost you the extra fee for the N-400 filing, though. Depends on what is worth more to the filier, money or greif dealing with the extension letter. EDIT: Saw that someone posted similar while I was in a meeting and halfway through typing the above!

Too late to edit this again but another thought: Now they can completely ignore any filing from now until at best 9 months from now. Not even touch the file for a preliminary review beyond completeness for accepting the payment and update to re-use fingerprints. Just shelf it and concentrate on all of the really old past dues, knowing that they won't even look at it again until it gets pushed with the N-400. And then they have until three years before touching a I-751 at all. Frees up a bunch of time to get onto schedule again. Mark my words, the new normal will be I-751/N-400 combo filings on average 11-14 months. I-751 alone will be 30-48 months. Virtually nothing in between unless they get substantially caught up and even then it can only start shortening the I-751 only filings. Really can't shorten combo filings since the minimun time between I-751 filing and N-400 filing will be 9 months. Add two months to handle that paperwork, best case, and you would be at the 11 month window. Probably never see another I-751 approval in less than a year, even if they do get caught up.

Funny how this thread had such a short life. They gave out 36 months for a what will be essentially two weeks. LOL

It's brilliant in a way. I do think this new extension will help N-400 filers. Now the government can intentionally sit on I-751 filings until they see N-400 come in, review it, then send it for a combo interview. If no N-400 comes in by year 3 then stick the I-751 into the que and go from there. Saves them a lot of interview time by never having to do a I-751 and then a N400 interview. Most would be combos plus the people that have no intention of filing N-400 won't care that it is dragging on so long since they are legal for four years anyway. On top of that I can see it weeding out some additional fraudulent filers. If people have to stay married for four more years after arrival, then submit enough evidence, they are clear. Then they can concentrate on scrutinzing the divorce waiver filings. It could cut down on review efforts by concentrating on the much smaller percentage that file with a waiver. All of them then get interviews and we already know that all of the N-400 filers would get interviews with the combo interview. Everyone gets one interview. No risk based interview waivers. I'm even more positive of my decision to file N-400 at the earliest possible opportunity.

I posted this in the January 2023 filer thread but for anyone that isn't following that specific month thread they wouldn't see this. We just got our extension letters today. Instead of extending the expiration 24 months our letters are good for 36 months. Doesn't look like they anticipate anything getting better any time soon. At least it will avoid some of the problems people are running into with 24 month letters and still not being done and needing to make an appointment for an ADIT stamp.

Add to this we received our 797C letters today. Only 9 days from sending packet to receipt of letters. But as a dose of reality on how slowly things are moving, the extension time on our letters isn't 24 months. It is now good for 36 months!

MSC

They are using the original fingerprints taken earlier so we don't have to go again to get them taken for the i-751. Saves a trip.

Wow, we are flying now! Sent packet January 11 Text received January 16 Check cleared January 18 File updated to "Prints were taken" on January 18. Almost done in one week! LOL Just kidding.

It's not really a worry but my wife's daughter will age out of being automatically granted citizenship under her mother's N-400 application if it goes past October 2024. If so she would have to wait for the five year timeframe insted of thee years and have to submit her own application, pay her own fee and do her own civics test, etc. I will at least try for one expedite if it looks like it won't make it. It's not a true "age out" case but they may at least consider it.

Sent packet January 11. Just got the text so that part was pretty quick. Got assigned MSC...Is that the death sentence of a wait? Planned on filing for N-400 at Christmas this year.

That makes sense as well as the previous post about credit card statements. We didn't have those. And since we were to include all sheets it could easily be 10 sheets per month for each and if one did every month that could really drive up the count. Personally I saw no reason to do every consecutive month. Nothing specific would happen in a two month gap that would cause concern by the agent if the third one in line still showed continutiy and made sense. But that may be me "under simplifying" things.

Maybe I'm being naive, but if you show house, cars, every type of insurance in both names, benficiary on investment accounts, three years of joint tax returns, years of joint bank accounts, photos of holidays with extended US family, who could even think you weren't together? All of the above was under 100 pages of good, clean, solid evidence. Perhaps if someone doesn't own property or have a lot of comingling of assets and feel they don't have a lot of hard evidence they may try to bury the agent with everything they can think of. Not saying the person I asked the question of is in that situation. Maybe just concerned about a RFE or a delay.

Serious question - how does someone come up with that much paper? I had everything requested on the instructions for additional evidence and it was maybe a total of 100 sheets of paper. I did cut the bank account statements to every three months but that's it. Fit into a standard Fedex envelope. Maybe half a pound.

I'm going to help her file the N-400 as soon as possible as it appears by my reading this forum section and the N-400 forum that it more often than not gets it moving again. As it sits now, based on normal processing for LIN which I assume I'll get since we live IN Lincoln and Nebraska typically goes to LIN it is 19 months. That would put it done August of 2024. My wife's daughter will turn 18 in September so not much wiggle room to naturalize as a minor under Mom's N-400 when we file it. Otherwise she will have to wait two additional years to the five year point and naturalize on her own plus another N-400 fee. I'm just hoping that whomever is working on our case happens to notice that we live in the same town and just MAYBE move along someone who may live next door to them. Hey, it's always possible! We might be one of those "ROC in 30 days" cases. LOL The extra two years isn't a big deal as she will be staying in the US for college and then work. We will be moving back to Vietnam after getting my wife citizenship so I'll have to help remotely with the N-400 paperwork plus the extra $680 and she will have to do her own civics interview.

Sent my wife and daughter's 1-751 today. Fully planning to need to file N-400 before their ROC is completed.

i-130

LOL, I filed as soon as I got home from a trip there less than three months after the marriage. It's not even the extra money for the ROC filing. It's the risk that my retirement plans may be pushed out. I had it all laid out. Her and her daughter would be eliglble for citizenship at the end of her daughter's last semester of her senior year so finish citizenship for both, her daughter graduates and then she can go to college and we retire and move back to Vietnam. Now I see that could realistically be stretched another year or even more. I hope not. But I suppose that if it goes an extra year it won't be the end of the world. We can get her daughter settled in college for the first year and then go.

We were so close to getting meeting the two year date for IR-1 I should have risked it and cancelled our Consulate interview. We had been waiting for the consulate to open in Vietnam while we were living there due to COVID so the I-130 took about 15 months total due to waiting for the interview. They closed the consulate for several months. While at least through that part of the immigration journey I was with my wife and understand that most of you were seperated from your spouses during COVID I was just getting tired of not being able to come back to the US. So, we took the November 1 2021 interview that was finally scheduled after witing since June or so. Had I left the country I wouldn't have been able to get back into Vietnam due to the border closing to all but VN citizens. We got my wife and daughter's medicals done before that interview on October 19, so when we had the interview the CR-1 visa was only good until April 19 2022. Our two year anniversary was April 28, 2022. Had I known how long it takes for ROC after the two year green card I definitely would have risked cancelling the interview even if the reschedule would have been even two or three months later. We had already planned on moving to the US, getting citizenship and then moving back to Vietnam. Now I see that naturalizaitons are being held up because they can't seem to get I-751's processed in a timely manner. I do wish I would have held out for the IR-1. Or, I had heard from others that we should have gone to the interview without the medical done, taken the interview, got an RFE for the medical and waited a bit and then turned in the medical which would have gotten us to be able to use the November 1 date for the start of the six month visa which would have just barely got us past the two year date. But, I was concerned they might just turn us away for not having the medical and not let us interview. Sorry, just a rant as I'm preparing my i-751 package.