CASE: Adjustment of Status at Removal Proceeding
CLIENT: Gabonese
LOCATION: Cleveland, OH

Our client came to the United States in July 2011 with a B-2 visitor’s visa from Gabon.  Later, she filed for asylum and her asylum application was denied by the immigration judge in Cleveland. She filed a BIA appeal and the BIA remanded her case in 2016.  She married a U.S. Citizen in October 2017. Our client’s husband filed an I-130 petition on behalf of our client, and this I-130 petition was approved by the USCIS Cincinnati Field Office in August 2018. However, she also applied for adjustment of status and this was administratively closed due to removal proceedings.  Our client contacted our office to seek legal representation.

Our client retained us on November 16, 2018. Thereafter, our office prepared and filed the I-485 Adjustment of Status Application and other supporting documents to the Cleveland Immigration Court at her Master Calendar hearing on December 11, 2018. We withdrew our client’s asylum case as well.   

On April 12, 2019, Attorney Sung Hee (Glen) Yu represented our client’s at her Individual Hearing for adjustment of status at the Cleveland Immigration Court.  After the hearing, the Immigration Judge granted our client’s adjustment of status relief. Our client’s removal proceeding is terminated simultaneously. Now, our client becomes a green card holder.    

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CASE: Marriage-Based Adjustment of Status

NATIONALITY: Filipina                                                                                                    

LOCATION: Mississippi

Our client is from the Philippines who came to the U.S. on a J-1 exchange visitor’s visa in October 2014. Her J-1 program was not subject to the 2-year foreign residency requirement (INA Section 212(e)).  In May 2017, our client married her current U.S. citizen husband. After she got married, she retained our office for her green card application. Our firm prepared and filed the I-130 Petition and I-485 Adjustment of Status Application on June 8, 2018.  Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, fingerprint appointment, and work permits all came on time. Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients at our office via conference calls. On March 19, 2019, our client was interviewed at the New Orleans, Louisiana USCIS office. Eventually, on April 8, 2019, her green card application was approved.

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CASE: Marriage-Based Adjustment of Status

NATIONALITY: Indian                                                                                                       

LOCATION: Cleveland, OH

Our Indian client came to the U.S. on an H-1B visa. In September 2018, our client married his current U.S. citizen wife.  He retained our office for his green card application. Our firm prepared and filed the I-130 Petition and I-485 Adjustment of Status Application on October 18, 2018. Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, fingerprint appointment, and work permits all came on time. Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients at our office. On April 5, 2019, our client was interviewed at the Cleveland Ohio USCIS office. Attorney Sung Hee (Glen) Yu from our office accompanied our clients. On the same day, April 5, 2019, his green card application was approved.

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CASE: Green Card Approval after Termination of Removal Proceedings with an Approved I-130 Petition

CLIENT: British
LOCATION: Applicant (Dallas, TX area), EOIR (Los Angeles, CA)

Our client is from the United Kingdom who came to the U.S. on a visa waiver in 2002. Soon after her entry to the U.S., she filed for asylum in the United States. Her asylum application was denied at the Los Angeles Immigration Court in October 2003. She has appealed the Immigration Judge’s decision to the Board of Immigration Appeals and the BIA found to remand her case to the Immigration Court in July 2009. Her case was administratively closed by the immigration judge in August 2014.  

Our client married her U.S. citizen husband in December 2013. In August 2014, her husband filed an I-130 petition for her, and this petition was approved in November 2016. In January 2017, she contacted our office to seek legal assistance for the representation of her removal proceedings, termination of removal proceedings, and her adjustment of status application with the USCIS.

In October 9, 2017, our office filed a request to Motion to Re-Calendar and terminate proceedings with an attached I-485 application and its supporting documents to the Los Angeles Immigration Court. Eventually, the Immigration Judge granted the Motion to terminate without prejudice on October 17, 2017.

After her removal proceeding was terminated, our client retained us again for her I-485 adjustment of status application.  Our firm prepared and filed the I-485 Adjustment of Status Application on November 10, 2017. Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, fingerprint appointment, and work permit all came on time. Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients. On March 25, 2019, our client was interviewed at the Irving, Texas USCIS Field Office.  After the interview, her I-485 application was approved on March 26, 2019. Now, our client became a green card holder.

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CASE: Marriage-Based Adjustment of Status

NATIONALITY: Italian                                                                                                        

LOCATION: Cleveland, OH

Our client is from Italy who came to the U.S. on a B-2 visitor’s visa in April 2018. In August 2018, our client married his current U.S. citizen wife.  He retained our office on August 21, 2018 for his green card application. Our firm prepared and filed the I-130 Petition and I-485 Adjustment of Status Application on September 17, 2018. Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, fingerprint appointment, and work permits all came on time. Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients at our office. On March 22, 2019, our client was interviewed at the Cleveland Ohio USCIS office. Attorney Sung Hee (Glen) Yu from our office accompanied our clients at their interview as well.  The interview went well and eventually his green card application was approved after the interview.

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CASE: Marriage-Based Green Card (Same Sex Marriage Case)

CLIENT: Singaporean

LOCATION: Wyoming

Our client came to the United States from Singapore as a visa waiver visitor in March 2018. He married his U.S. Citizen same-sex spouse in June 2018.

On June 26, 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court held that restricting U.S. federal interpretation of “marriage” and “spouse” to apply only to heterosexual unions, by Section 3 of the defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), is unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. United States v. Windsor, 570 U.S. ___ (2013). After Windsor decision, the USCIS implemented a new policy that the USCIS officer must review immigration via petitions filed on behalf of a same-sex spouse in the same manner as those filed on behalf of an opposite-sex spouse. As long as a same-sex couple is married in a U.S. state that recognizes same-sex marriage, their marriage shall be considered a valid marriage under the immigration law.

They married in Wyoming where same-sex marriage is recognized. Our client contacted our office and retained us on June 12, 2018 for his I-130 petition and I-485 adjustment of status application. Our firm prepared and filed the I-130 petition and I-485 adjustment of status application, together with all necessary supporting documents, on September 11, 2018. Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, fingerprint appointment, and work permits all came on time.

Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients via conference calls. On March 12, 2019, our client was interviewed at the Centennial, Colorado USCIS office. The interview went well and his green card application was approved on the same day.

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CASE: Marriage-Based Adjustment of Status

CLIENT: Ghanaian

LOCATION: Fairfax, VA

Our client came to the United States from Ghana on a F-1 student visa to pursue her Master’s degree in the United States. She married a U.S. Citizen in April 2016 in Ohio and they have lived together in Ohio until August 2017.  In August 2017, our client started her new job in Washington DC so she had to move to DC area. However, her husband was still in school, so he had to stay in Ohio. Nevertheless, our client maintained her bona fide marital relationship with her husband.

She retained our office on May 4, 2018 for her green card application.  Our firm prepared and filed the I-130 Petition and Adjustment of Status Application on June 12, 2018.  Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, fingerprint appointment, and work permits all came on time. Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients via conference calls. On January 8, 2019, our client was interviewed at Fairfax, Virginia USCIS office. Attorney Sung Hee (Glen) Yu from our office accompanied our clients as well. Our client’s interview was very intense and the USCIS officer separated our client and her husband during the interview. Nevertheless, the couple was able to answer a majority of the questions in the two-hour interview.

Nonetheless, the USCIS office issued Request for Evidence on January 9, 2019 regarding our client’s husband’s child-support documents and school records. Our office filed the Response for RFE on January 28, 2019.  Eventually, on March 4, 2019, her green card application was approved.

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CASE: Marriage-Based Adjustment of Status

NATIONALITY: Filipina

LOCATION: Denver, CO

Our client is from the Philippines who came to the U.S. on a B-2 visitor’s visa in April 2018. In June 2018, our client married her current U.S. citizen husband.  She retained our office for her green card application, and our firm prepared and filed the I-130 Petition and I-485 Adjustment of Status Application on August 23, 2018.  Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, fingerprint appointment, and work permits all came on time. Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients via conference calls. On February 28, 2019, our client was interviewed at the Centennial Colorado USCIS office.  Eventually, on the same day of the interview, her green card application was approved.

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Case: I-130/I-485
Applicant/Beneficiary – Korean
Location: Cleveland, OH

Our client entered the United States in June 2018 from South Korea under the visa waiver program. He came here to visit his U.S. citizen girlfriend (now his wife) during the summer. As a Visa Waiver Entrant, he was only authorized to remain in the United States only for 90 days.  

Later, in July of 2018, our client and his U.S. citizen girlfriend married in the United States. He contacted our office and retained our office on August 1, 2018.  One main issue in his green card application through marriage was the fact that he came to the United States under the visa waiver program.   As our office wrote in our previous success story with a similar issue,  under the visa waiver program, citizens of certain countries can enter the U.S. for 90 days without a visa with the condition that the visitor waives his or her right to contest removal (other than on the basis of asylum).  The “no-contest” provision of the Visa Waiver Program is fundamental; if someone could enter under the VWP and then contest removability, it would defeat the whole purpose of the Program which is to make it easy for certain nationals to come to the United States to visit and then leave without all the red-tape involved in visa issuance.

Since our client resided in Cleveland, Ohio, his application had a better chance compared to states under the 9th Circuit (see Momeni v. Chertoff).  However, it was quite foreseeable that the USCIS field office will exercise its discretion to deny his application because of his visa waiver entry.  

Nevertheless, our office filed the I-130 Petition and I-485 Adjustment of Status Application on August 7, 2018.  Our office requested the CIS to exercise favorable discretion in granting adjustment of status and argued that the application was filed before her authorized stay period was expired. Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, the fingerprint appointment, and the work permit all came on time.  Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients. On March 5, 2019, our client was interviewed at the Cleveland, Ohio USCIS Field Office. Attorney Sung Hee (Glen) Yu accompanied them at the interview as well.  Despite the visa waiver issue, the USCIS officer approved her green card application on March 6, 2019.  Now, our client becomes a green card holder.

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CASE: Marriage-Based Adjustment of Status

CLIENT: Burkinabe

LOCATION: Cleveland, OH

Our client came to the United States from Burkina Faso on a F-1 student visa in January 2018. He married a U.S. Citizen in July 2018 and retained our office on July 17, 2018 for his green card application.  Our firm prepared and filed the I-130 Petition and I-485 Adjustment of Status Application on August 15, 2018. Everything went smoothly and the receipt notices, fingerprint appointment, and work permits all came on time. Prior to the interview, we thoroughly prepared our clients. On February 19, 2019, our client was interviewed at the Cleveland, Ohio USCIS office. Attorney Sung Hee (Glen) Yu from our office accompanied our clients as well. Eventually, on February 26, 2019, his green card application was approved.

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