aerokkaido

Thanks for this. I assume a source of concern on the CBP's part about working illegally is that they stayed for four months instead of the original 4 weeks they stated. We have totally valid reasons for that delay, and I do understand the suspicion on part of the CBP for this, but I just wish they would actually interview us instead of trying to intimidate us. I guess it's also unusual for a 24 year old like myself and a 21 year old like my fiancee to be as self sufficient as we are (we work extremely hard). I knew this in the back of my head but some of the replies here made it obvious that were more of an outlier then usual. If for whatever reason we need to visit in the USA we'll keep the visit short to avoid suspicions of working and have ample proof of their ties in Ecuador (college transcripts, leases, their job is in Ecuador, etc). I was already planning on visiting her in Ecuador anyways before this so I am in a lucky position, or at least as lucky as someone can be when they have to wait a while to live with someone they love. Thank you and thanks for helping the site, it's been a huge help before I even made an account. People might not believe me but I did actually do a lot of research to try and avoid any issues, there are so many different variables involved that its really hard to cover everything. People keep saying we got lucky, but we had a good understanding of the process around the K-1 visa and this helped us convince the border control agent: "The harder I work, the luckier I get".

I've been getting a million different answers on what happens if she's denied entry or not. If there's any good resources here that would be great to share with others! I believe it would just be a revoke in her case since she's never done anything illegal (overstayed, worked, etc).

Main points: - This has no effect on K1 visa approval or rejection process. - You are allowed to visit on a B2 visa while you have another visa pending; it may raise suspicion but it's allowed. - If she is denied entry in the future, it's not necessarily a ban as others have said. It's up to the officer, in this case the officer would have revoked the B2 visa and sent them back but she would not have been banned from entry if the K1 visa was approved. Theres also lots of good advice on this thread, I've been looking at the reputation of long term members and taking their advice. I also talked to an attorney to confirm some questions this post raised, such as above.

This experience has led to me believing that there should be better defined rules on the B2 visa. It's not very clear to anyone what exactly is "living" vs "visiting" and it's entirely subjective, to us, we believed it was clear that my fiancee was visiting because she would need to go back for college and leases an apartment in Ecuador. To others, that she is sleeping in my apartment constitutes "living" with me. I had no idea this was such an important distinction and a mistake we made was not being prepared how to answer CBP about this. Still, the two of us are very organized and plan a lot. The official documentation on the B2 visa is very lacking: https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/us-visas/tourism-visit/visitor.html/visa

To be clear, I did talk to an immigration attorney and since she was let in, this does not affect the K-1 visa. Only denial of entry or denial of visa will affect the K-1 visa. Therefore we are doing what most people and the attorney suggested and waiting until she gets the K-1 visa to visit in the USA; or in the scenario where the K-1 visa is not processed within a year, we will compile a ton of documentation to prove her ties to Ecuador (lease, transcripts, bank statements, etc) and make a brief visit. Therefore we are waiting twice as long as our cumulative time together this year. But ideally, we will wait until the K1 is approved. Theres a lot of misinformation on this thread, so if anyone reads this in the future I highly recommend getting a free consultation with an attorney. If you are poor, you can use free services like the Catholic church's immigration office or the volunteer legal association,

How is this an abuse of the B2? The B2 specifically states that your allowed to stay for SIX MONTHS. We did not go past six months or close to six months at any point. In the entire year, over five different trips, it will have been 5 months. It would have been a smaller amount of time if her family in Chicago didn't kick her out because she was dating me, as I already said, we did not plan on having it be this long and we have our reasons. Either way, not an abuse. In the B2 tourist visa official page, it has "visiting friends/family" as a valid reason: https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/us-visas/tourism-visit/visitor.html/visa. This is obviously not a paid vacation and no one ever said it was.

I don't think this actually matters because they aren't going to check my records/passport when she's the one flying into the USA. Thanks for the relationship advice.

By a year, the I-129f should hopefully (statistically likely) be approved; due to timing with her College, it's likely that we would need to visit each other in some time when the I-129f is approved but the interview has not taken place. Do you know if it's safer or not to travel to the USA on a tourist visa if you have a pending consulate interview? Intuitively I am leaning towards just biting the bullet and waiting at that point. I was already planning on visiting after this, but we'll have to wait another 6 months after in that case. Thanks and congrats on your own success from Ecuador.

Combined, she's spent about 5 months in total on a tourist visa. Of that, most of it is 4 months several months ago (the one longer then planned), 3 week long visits, and then this month for 3 weeks. Thanks for the advice.

Firstly, I want to get some things clear because I know everyone will say this otherwise: We are seeing an immigration attorney for consultation soon We've already printed out several documents to prove that my fiancée is not coming here with the intent to live here for the future until they get the K-1 Visa Now. Heres the actual story: Recently, when my my Ecuadorian, non US citizen, girlfriend arrived at O'Hare from her flight, an agent threatened to deport her; basically, because she had stayed previously for four months with me previously. The agent was aggressive from the start and insinuated that my girlfriend was working illegally (she was not) because she had previously stayed here for four months instead of a month as it was stated on the original airplane ticket (when that happened, we simply decided to live together before she went back to college to see if the relationship was worth the effort of dating across countries). Also, it's important to note she was here three times after those four months, and that this was about 8 months ago. The agent eventually called me to verify that she lived with me and again was very aggressive. I communicated the basics of our relationship with the agent, that we met in Ecuador, we have been dating for a year, that she's a student at college in Ecuador, and that we did not originally plan to have her live with me for four months but that then she decided to try for longer until she had to start school again. At one point I communicated that I had sent the I-129F form to be reviewed, so that eventually, my girlfriend would need to come to the USA so we could get married, and the agent got extremely upset. She misunderstood what the I-129F form is and believed I was trying to file an adjustment status of citizenship for her (I-1485), instead of getting a K-1 visa. I tried explaining that she had the wrong idea and she told me that she knew more then me, and threatened to deport my girlfriend right then and there. Finally, eventually I got through to her and she let my girlfriend go but stated that she cannot stay any longer then a day after her flight to leave (around 3 weeks). Her leaving then is fine but we are really concerned about what this means in the future for when she is trying to come to the United States from Ecuador to see me in the timeframe before the I-129f is approved and she is able to marry me. Again, we did nothing wrong and I'm really angry/sad that this happening to us. What options should I pursue here? If anything happens the next time she comes here, is there anything we could end up doing? In general, I'm looking for advice on how seriously to treat this, I.E was this one officer who was mad or do we need to be super careful anytime she goes to the US for us to talk before the I-129F is approved.