Tag Archives: green card

Green Card History & The Application Process Today

Green Card & Citizenship, Guest Posts, , ,

1) Have you ever wondered where the Green Card Process came from?
The system was first started in the early 1800’s as a National Defense program. During those times there was a huge increase in immigration to the United States. The amount of people coming into the country was so great, a system had to be created to keep track of all immigrants. It was a very large and difficult task to accomplish. In today’s world we process well over a million immigration applications a year. Can you imagine what this would have been like in the early 1800’s when everything was processed manually without computers?

2) History was made between 1820 and 1879 when over 49 million immigrants enter the country.
Those years alone counted for one of the biggest booms the United States of American has ever seen. Cities were built and the country grew by leaps and bounds.

3) Did you know the first immigrants ever to reach the United States were the Asians and Indians.
They were the first true immigrants to the United States. They taught the others how to survive the hard winters and where a large part of the development of the United States.

4) Did you know in 1940 the U.S Resident Green Card was white?
There really was never a real green colored card. If you want to dig further into the past, you will find that the greed card was never really a card at all, but a receipt. You see back in the 1800’s it was really effortless to become a citizen of the United States. You landed on the shore, took a number, went through a few medical checkups and then you received a receipt. This receipt had a unique number attached to it. That number was considered your green card. The immigration department knew who you were and where you came from by that receipt. Not much consideration was done to ensure the receipt endured the harshness of the land or weather. Throughout the years the green card took on many diverse colors. Today the card is more white than green.

As the years go on, the laws will change and so will the green card. As technology changes so will the green card. There may come a day when the green card is your fingerprint or may even be the unique characteristic of your eyes or voice.

There is one thing next to taxes and dying we can count on and that is the need for an ever changing green card. At no time in the history of the United States has immigration every been more politically challenged and influenced over the last five to ten years. There has been a slow creep towards making it harder for people to immigrate to the USA. These are the slow changes that have enable the green card to change over the many decades and centuries and it will be the same slow process that will enable the green card to change with the ever increasing threat to national security of the USA.

We are an ever changing people, and country. The world and a people will adjust to meet these different challenges. Those that enter the USA will also be a part of those changes. They will help to shape a nation and become a product part of a hard working society. They will champion the will of the people and build dreams where only despair once lived. This is what the USA has stood for and will continue to stand for as the decades and centuries come and go. The green card is a badge of understanding between the USA and all that come to her shores. The green card stand as a sign of pride and of a dream of a better life for those that come test the waters of immigrating to the land of the free and the home of the brave.


Guest Author
Art Saborio

Green Card Sponsorship For Foreign Family Members

Green Card & Citizenship, , , , , , , , , , , ,

We have written posts in the past about what exactly a green card is and how you can apply for one. One of the ways is of course via the Green Card Lottery, then there is the more common employer sponsored green cards if you are on a visa like the H1B visa or E3 Visa and also the more difficult EB-5 visa category for foreigners starting a business.

However the most common are the family sponsored Green Cards. Whether that be via the K-1 visa where a US citizen chooses to marry someone from another country within the US, via the K-3 visa where a US citizen has already married a foreigner abroad and is looking to bring them to the US or the one which we will discuss today which is family sponsored green cards for immediate relatives like parents, older children and adult siblings.
These are generally not subject to numerical limits (possibly with exception of adult siblings) and also have the lowest processing times which is sometimes as short as 5 months, which in US Immigration world is like lightning 🙂

To qualify and be eligible to sponsor what the US Immigration system deems an immediate relative to be, you must (a) Prove you are a US citizen (or legal Permanent Resident with a Green Card) with documentation such as a US Passport or Naturalization Certificate and (b) Be above a designated income threshold and thus have the ability to support the relative you are sponsoring at 125% above the mandated poverty line.

The process can be quite involved which is why unfortunately in my opinion so many people become hopelessly lost and because they desperately want the application to have no issues are forced into the greedy waiting arms of an Immigration Attorney. Suddenly and sadly a fundamental human right in a free society like a family reunion now has a financial tag and burden which says a lot about the current US Immigration system.

  1. Essentially this step is a lot of what I mentioned above in that it has to proved that the sponsor is a US Citizen or Permanent resident, then that an immediate family relationship does exist and finally that the immediate relative is essentially of good character (i.e. not a criminal or threat to US, etc.)
  2. Most often, the U.S. citizen or permanent resident will file an immigrant visa petition on Form I-130 (Petition for Alien Relative)
  3. It is also possible to concurrently file the immigrant visa petition and the application for permanent residence on behalf of the relative themselves in certain family sponsored cases, This is filed on Form I-485 and called an adjustment of status usually when the relative is already in the country legally. However this is not always the case as with US citizens for example marrying illegal aliens as the US Immigration system calls them, which are generally people who came here illegally or over stayed their original non-immigrant visa like the J-1 visa. The biggest advantage of adjusting status is the ability of the immediate relative to get the permanent status i.e. green card without having to leave the United States. Now this is where they system becomes skewed to favoring the use of Immigration attorneys where the immediate relative may not be a “perfect” candidate.

The benefits of a Green Card or Permanent Residency are essentially boiled down to 3 main areas;
– Be able to study at any institution or work for any employer or indeed choose not to work/study
– Be able to come into and leave the US any time and any number of times
– Have the future possibility to apply for US Citizenship

CJ