Shane C

Also, federal immigration employees have high salary jobs with about a month of annual leave. Your average American makes a fraction of their income and are lucky to get one or two weeks vacation, assuming your boss will let them take leave. So jumping on a plane 2-3 a year to visit your fiance in another country isn't an option for blue collar American workers. We all have inherent biases based on our unique life experiences. Unfortunately, visa decisions are made by single individuals who may subconsciously interject their biases into their decisions. It may not seem normal to a consular officer making six figures and a month of annual leave that someone wouldn't fly to another country to visit their fiance several times a year. But if they can remove themselves from their life bubbles and put themselves in other people's shoes, they would realize not everyone has that option.

Unfortunately, there are different standards/unwritten rules for different countries. One in-person visit is typically enough for a country in Western Europe. But if you're fiance is from Africa, a predominantly Muslim country, China, Russia, etc. the rules aren't the same. My fiance is currently in administrative processing. She has several university degrees and no criminal record, but being from Belarus created added scrutiny in the process. Immigration officers rarely look at the character and merits of the individual, but the country they come from as a whole. The visa applicant could walk on water, but none of that matters if they're from a heavily scrutinized country. If my fiance would've been from Western Europe, she would've been in the US months ago. I've lived in sanctuary cities where people in the country illegally could do practically everything a legal citizen could do except vote. Yet, those who follow the rules and opt to go through the legal immigration system, are put through seemingly endless wait times and other problems. It's not fair, but it's something we can't change, at least not in the short-term. Assuming there's not something about the denial you're not disclosing, you may need to move to her country, get married and live for a season while you apply for a marriage visa.