CASE: J-1 Waiver of the Two-Year Foreign Residency Requirement, Hardship
NATIONALITY: Ghanaian
LOCATION: St. Louis, MO
Our client came from Ghana as a J-1 scholar in 2008. His J-1 status made him subject to the two-year foreign residency requirement. Our client would like to file his adjustment of status application along with his U.S. citizen wife’s I-130 petition; however, due to the two-year foreign residency requirement, he had to obtain a waiver first.
Unlike our other J-1 clients, our client could not pursue his waiver under the No Objection Statement or Interest Government Agency (IGA). Our client also received government funding for his research programs which made his case tougher for the No Objection Statement or IGA waiver route. Our client though would like to pursue his J-1 waiver based on the exceptional hardship standard.
According to 8 C.F.R. Section 212.7(c)(5), “an alien who is subject to the foreign residence requirement and who believes that compliance therewith would impose exceptional hardship upon her spouse or child who is a citizen of the United States… may apply for a waiver on Form I-612.”
Some of the factors in analyzing extreme hardship are as follows: age of the subject, family ties in the U.S. and abroad, length and residency in the U.S., health / medical conditions, conditions in the country of removal – economic and political, financial status – business and occupation, position in / ties to the community. Matter of Anderson, 16 I&N Dec. 596 (BIA 1978).
After he retained our firm, we prepared and filed a waiver request through the exceptional hardship basis. On April 1, 2019, the J-1 Waiver (Form DS-3035) Application was filed to the Department of State. Thereafter, our office prepared an affidavit of our client, an extensive brief in support of our client’s J-1 waiver application, and other supporting documents. Our client provided us with extensive medical documents and doctor’s reports for his U.S. citizen wife’s medical conditions. On April 2, 2019, our office filed an I-612 application to the USCIS and asked for them to issue and recommend this waiver based on the fact that our client’s wife would experience exceptional hardship if our client needs to go back to Ghana for two years.
On November 7, 2019, the USCIS issued a Request for Evidence (RFE) for our client’s I-612 case. The USCIS asked our client to submit more evidence to demonstrate the exception hardship to his U.S. citizen wife if he has to go back to Ghana for 2 years. On January 27, 2020, our office filed a Response to RFE to the USCIS along with additional documents to support the claim of financial and medical hardship including income and expenses, plus more recent medical documents of his U.S. citizen wife evidencing the hardship.
Eventually, the USCIS approved his I-612 waiver on July 29, 2021. Now that our client’s two-year foreign residency requirement is waived, he can file his adjustment of status application along with his wife’s I-130 petition.