Immigration Corner | What will happen to my uncle and aunt?

Dear Mrs Walker-Huntington,

My dad submitted applications for his siblings (brother and sister) and they were approved and given a priority date of May 2009. They are currently waiting on visas to become available from the National Visa Center.

Both siblings were married at the time of application with children under 18 years old – 15, seven, six, and one.

Will these children as well as their spouses be issued visas as beneficiaries? Or since some of the children are now over 18 years old, would they no longer be eligible?

Also, does he need to check in periodically with the Visa Center to ensure the cases do not become abandoned?

Thank you for taking the time to read and reply.

AA

Dear AA,

A US citizen is allowed to file a petition for their sibling to migrate to America. That petition is in the fourth preference category (F4) of family sponsorships and historically takes the longest to make it to completion. The long waiting period is a combination of the number of applications vs the number of visas available each year. Since the pandemic, the wait time has been complicated by backlogs at the US Department of State.

In December 2023, visas are available for persons in the F4 category with priority dates earlier than April 22, 2007. However, prior to the interview, fees need to be paid, applications completed, and documents submitted. For the corresponding period in December 2023, the National Visa Center (NVC) is working on F4 applications submitted before March 1, 2008.

The visa bulletin should be monitored each month to track when the paperwork processing for this NVC stage should begin. Your relatives’ priority date of May 2009 indicates that they do not have that much time before they need to pay fees and begin consular processing.

In the F4 category, spouses and minor children of the intending immigrant are derivative beneficiaries and are permitted to migrate with the primary beneficiary – if they are otherwise admissible to the United States. Derivative children beneficiaries who reach the age of 21 years when the visa is available ‘age out’ of the visa process – unless they qualify under the Child Status Protection Act to retain child status and migrate with their parent. Spouses remain eligible even if they were not married to the primary beneficiary at the time the initial petition was filed with US Citizenship & Immigration Services.

Dahlia A. Walker-Huntington, Esq. is a Jamaican-American attorney who practises immigration law in the United States; and family, criminal and international law in Florida. She is a diversity and inclusion consultant, mediator, and former special magistrate and hearing officer in Broward County, Florida. info@walkerhuntington.com