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First Step for Family and Employment Green Cards: The Visa Petition
The date your family member or employer sent in the visa petition becomes your "priority date," which is like your number in line at a bakery counter. By checking the monthly Visa Bulletin on the State Department's website, you can see which priority dates are currently being served -- that is, who is being allowed to move forward with Applying for a Green Card.
Shortcut for Immediate Relatives
Immediate relatives, such as the parents, spouse, or minor, unmarried children of a U.S. citizen, not only don't have to worry about priority dates, they have an important advantage if they are living in the United States. If they qualify for what's known as "adjustment of status," a procedure in which the entire green card application is done without leaving the United States, they can submit the adjustment of status application to USCIS together with the visa petition. That can save several months of waiting for USCIS to decide on the visa petition. However, this option is not available to everyone -- in particular, immigrants who entered the U.S. illegally can't normally use this option.
How to Prepare the Visa Petition
For more information on preparing and submitting a visa petition, and ultimately the green card application, see How to Get a Green Card (if you're immigrating through family); Fiancé and Marriage Visas: A Couple's Guide to U.S. Immigration (if you're immigrating based on marriage); or U.S. Immigration Made Easy (if you're immigrating through an employer). All three are by Ilona Bray, and published by Nolo.
Immigration Law Resources
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