CASE: J-1 Waiver of the Two-Year Foreign Residency Requirement, Extreme Hardship
NATIONALITY: Iraqi
LOCATION: Loveland, CO
Our client came from Iraq as a J-1 Fulbright scholar in January 2015. She was subject to the two-year foreign residency requirement. Our client would like to file her adjustment of status application along with her US citizen husband’s I-130 petition; however, due to the two-year foreign residency requirement, she had to obtain a waiver first.
Unlike our other J-1 clients, our client could not pursue her waiver under the No Objection Statement or Interest Government Agency (IGA). Our client also received government funding for her research program which made her case tougher for the No Objection Statement or IGA waiver route. Our client though would like to pursue her J-1 waiver based on exceptional hardship.
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 she retained our firm, we prepared and filed a waiver request through the exceptional hardship basis. On February 26, 2020, 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 her U.S. citizen husband’s medical conditions. On March 9, 2020, our office filed the I-612 application to the USCIS and asked them to issue and recommend this waiver based on the fact that our client’s husband would experience exceptional hardship if our client needs to go back to Iraq for two years.
Eventually, the USCIS approved her I-612 waiver on February 4, 2022. Now that our client’s two-year foreign residency requirement is waived, she can file her adjustment of status application along with her U.S. Citizen husband’s I-130 petition.