Getting a Green Card Through Marriage - What to Expect

I am a U.S. citizen, and several years ago I married a Brazilian. While many newlyweds spend their first weeks together honeymooning, we were busy working on my husband's application for a permanent resident card, or green card. I found that while U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, formerly INS, offers official advice on its Web site, it is rather vague in explaining the process. Hopefully, my experience can shed some light on what to expect.

We were married in September and almost immediately began filing paperwork. I completed the application myself, no lawyers or experts involved. It was a tedious, sometimes-frustrating job - but doable if you're up to it. You are asked for basic biographical information about yourself and your spouse, as well as both of your families. You, as the US citizen spouse, also must prove that you can support your new husband financially. I could not, and so we had to have someone else (my father), submit his tax forms and sign on as my husband's supporter, basically saying that my father was responsible if my husband ever needed welfare or anything like that. Kind of strange, but we never planned on my father actually supporting us.

By October, my husband had the required medical exam, including an HIV test. We did not have insurance at the time, and paid about $100 for the physical. He also had a required TB vaccine that we were able to get at a local clinic. You must also submit passport-sized photos of yourself and your spouse.

We paid the nearly $1,000 filing fee (current fees can be found at www.uscis.gov), and filed our application in December. By January, he had his Biometrics appointment, where they took his fingerprints and photo. In April, he received a permit to work in the country. He was anxious about our interview, and eventually we made an appointment to visit a USCIS location in person, when we were notified that we had missed our first interview appointment (which was in February) because they mailed the information to our former address. Luckily, they had already rescheduled our interview and it would take place in May. (Note: DO NOT miss your appointment. If you have to, you can reschedule ahead of time. Also, MAKE SURE to change your address as soon as you move. Because we had notified them of our address change, they agreed that the mistake was theirs and allowed us to reschedule.)

A note about making appointments: you make appointments online, and should plan a few weeks ahead of time. You must arrive early, and have proper ID with you. They have a lot of people to deal with, and we found that they only had several minutes to answer questions we had, and weren't terribly helpful. The appointments are during weekdays, and so we had to take time off of work to attend.

At our actual interview, we came prepared with proof that we were married: apartment lease, photos (which the interviewer copied for his records), marriage certificate, etc. We sat in the same room with one interviewer, and he just asked us for an overview of how we met, when we started living together, etc. If you are in an actual relationship with someone and living together, you do not need to worry about the interview. What you see on TV and in movies is just not accurate (separating you into 2 different rooms and asking you minute details about your lives, visiting your home, etc.). Things like that would only take place in extreme circumstances. The interviewer approved our application that day, and my husband received his Conditional Green Card in June.

Two years later, we had to apply to remove the "conditional" status on his residence. You can apply 3 months before the 2 year mark (he received his green card at the end of June, so we applied at the end of March nearly two years later). Again, paperwork is filed and fees are paid. It is basically a shorter, simpler version of the original application. He had another Biometrics appointment, and received his new Green Card (valid for 10 years) in July. In some cases, you will have to attend another interview in order to get this second green card. Luckily, we were able to satisfy USCIS with the information we provided (joint car lease, joint tax returns, etc.), and so we did not have another interview.

This June, he will have been a permanent resident for three years, and will be eligible to become a citizen. The process of dealing with USCIS can be a frustrating one, and there are many inaccurate ideas out there about Green Cards. I have certainly heard horror stories about immigration, but I feel my experience is an average one. As a side note: my husband and I have no criminal records, we had lived together for several months before getting married, and have a joint auto loan, all of which helped legitimize our marriage to USCIS. We live in California in a city with a large immigrant population, and still had a comparatively easy process. Good luck with USCIS!