Green Card Abandonment: Risks of Travel Abroad

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CBP officer discusses green card abandonment with permanent resident traveler

There are a number of methods which you can lose your standing as a lawful everlasting resident. Some of the frequent methods is thru unintentional inexperienced card abandonment. Everlasting residents could journey exterior the USA. Trip, household engagements, tourism, enterprise are all professional causes for momentary journey overseas. Nevertheless, everlasting residents who’re absent from the USA for prolonged intervals of time danger abandoning their everlasting resident standing.

In reality, the danger of inexperienced card abandonment is actual for any everlasting resident whose journey shouldn’t be momentary in nature. Every year, many inexperienced card holders coming back from journeys overseas discover themselves in jeopardy of dropping their standing as a result of their journeys will not be clearly momentary in nature.

The Abandonment Drawback

The issue sometimes surfaces when a everlasting resident reaches a U.S. port of entry and is questioned by a Customs and Border Safety (CBP) officer. A inexperienced card turns into invalid for reentry should you’ve been exterior the USA for one yr or extra. However even journeys of 180 days or extra can invite further questions in regards to the nature of your journey. The CBP officer could ask:

The place have you ever been exterior the U.S.?
How lengthy have been you there?
What have been you doing there?
Why are you coming to the U.S. now?
What ties to the U.S. did you retain when you have been away?

The CBP officer is making an attempt to find out the explanations for the abroad journey and your intent to take care of the U.S. because the principal place of residence. If the officer believes you have got deserted your lawful everlasting resident standing, she or he could ask you to signal Type I-407, File of Abandonment of Lawful Everlasting Resident Standing. If you wish to maintain your inexperienced card, refuse to signal this doc and converse to an immigration legal professional. As a result of you aren’t voluntarily giving up everlasting residence, the CBP officer could refer you to Immigration Courtroom for removing proceedings and a choose to find out if in case you have deserted your inexperienced card.

RECOMMENDED: Employment or College Overseas as a Inexperienced Card Holder

Reentry Allow

One option to proactively keep away from points with inexperienced card abandonment is to use for and acquire a reentry allow. In contrast to a inexperienced card, which is legitimate for return after an absence of as much as one yr, the reentry allow is legitimate for as much as two years. By acquiring the reentry earlier than departing, this journey doc helps show your intent to return to the USA.

A reentry allow will help you forestall inexperienced card abandonment in these three situations:

You anticipate to be absent from the U.S. for over one yr however lower than two years.

As beforehand talked about, your inexperienced card shouldn’t be legitimate for reentry after one yr. A lawful everlasting resident can use a reentry allow to reenter the U.S. after journeys as much as two years in size.

You anticipate to be absent from the U.S. for at the least 180 days (constantly) over a interval of two straight years.

If you spend extra time exterior the USA than inside it, you enhance the suspicion of inexperienced card abandonment. The reentry allow supplies a technique of proactively explaining the explanation in your anticipated and momentary absence.

CBP officer has warned you that you’re liable to inexperienced card abandonment.

residency requirements advised in passport

On earlier entries to the U.S. a CBP officer could have given you a verbal warning or notation close to your passport stamp. For instance, on the passport stamp to the precise, the handwritten notation says, “Suggested residency necessities.”

To use for a reentry allow, you need to file Type I-131, Software for Journey Doc. You’ll must be within the U.S. to file the applying and attend a biometrics appointment just a few weeks later. Acquire the reentry allow earlier than departing. Your complete course of make take roughly 4 to six months – so plan early. Some conditions could qualify for expedited processing with USCIS. If getting ready your I-131 software via CitizenPath, our submitting directions will clarify requested expedited processing.

Nevertheless, a reentry allow shouldn’t be a “treatment all.” It’s not a assure that it is possible for you to to reenter the USA. It’s nonetheless vital so that you can show to the CBP officer that you just haven’t deserted your inexperienced card. In case your journey overseas was for a similar momentary objective described in your reentry allow software, then it’s possible the officer will conclude your absence was momentary and can readmit you. Then again, you could possibly be liable to abandoning your everlasting residence if the officer determines that you haven’t maintained sufficiently robust ties with the USA.

RECOMMENDED: Reentry Allow for Everlasting Residents

Sustaining Ties to the U.S.

The period of your absence is only one issue that immigration officers use when figuring out if a visit was momentary. Along with the period of your journey, they are going to have a look at different facets of your go to overseas that counsel your intentions. Based on U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Providers (USCIS), among the different components that may point out that an absence was not momentary (no matter period of absence) embody: transferring to a different nation, desiring to reside abroad completely, failure to file a U.S. revenue tax return, and declaring your self a “nonimmigrant” in your U.S. tax returns. The CBP officer will contemplate the power of your ties within the U.S. in comparison with your ties overseas. Examples of questions the officer could ask embody:

Do you personal or hire a house in the USA?
In the event you personal or hire property within the U.S., do you have got entry to it and are your belongings in it, or have you ever rented it out to anyone else?
Do you personal or hire a house out of the country?
The place do you’re employed or go to highschool?
The place do your shut relations reside?
Do you file an revenue tax return annually within the U.S.?
The place do you retain your key property (e.g., financial institution accounts, bank card accounts, vehicles, insurance coverage)?
Do you have got a legitimate U.S. driver’s license?

Proof of Ties to the USA

Your solutions to an immigration officer’s query are necessary, however proof is much more compelling for proving your steady, uninterrupted intent to return to the USA.

Upon your return, be ready to obviously clarify the explanation in your momentary journey. If the absence prolonged past 180 days because of unexpected circumstances, it might proceed to be a brief journey as long as the intent was to all the time return to the USA. In reality, it should be your intent to return to your private home within the U.S. all through your complete journey. However an immigration officer doesn’t know what you’re pondering. So proof that you just’ve maintained robust ties to the USA carries extra weight.

Some examples of proof that could be used to assist corroborate your steady, uninterrupted intent to return to the U.S. embody:

Property deed or hire settlement in your dwelling;
U.S. financial institution and bank card accounts;
Present driver’s license in your state of residence;
Proof {that a} wage was paid by a U.S. employer inside an inexpensive time frame;
Proof of kids’s enrollment in a U.S. college;
U.S. revenue tax return(s) for the previous three yr(s); and
Membership and energetic participation in a U.S. skilled or social group.

Absences of Extra Than One 12 months

As beforehand talked about, a inexperienced card shouldn’t be legitimate for reentry to the USA in case your absence has been one yr or longer. So should you didn’t get hold of a reentry allow earlier than departing the U.S., what may be executed to keep away from inexperienced card abandonment?

Sure people could qualify for a returning resident (SB-1) visa. You need to be capable of show that the explanation in your prolonged keep was past your management and that your intent was all the time to return to the USA. A powerful SB-1 software embody all the following:

Correctly ready Type DS-117 (returning resident visa software)
Your everlasting resident card (inexperienced card)
Your re-entry allow if (relevant)
Proof that the explanation for staying overseas is past your management
Data on the dates of your journey exterior the U.S.
Proof of your intent to return to the U.S.
Proof of ties to the U.S.

File the applying with the U.S. embassy or consular workplace nearest you. The consular officer will grant the SB-1 visa if it’s decided that you just departed the U.S. with the intent of returning to an unrelinquished U.S. residence, and your keep overseas was for causes past your management. Strongly contemplate getting the help of an skilled immigration legal professional earlier than submitting this software.

Tips for Avoiding Inexperienced Card Abandonment

If attainable, journey conservatively. All the time maintain journeys overseas lower than 180 days, spend the vast majority of your time inside the USA, and preserve robust ties to your U.S. dwelling.

In case your circumstances pressure you to be exterior the USA for prolonged intervals of time – particularly if in case you have been warned by a CBP officer – search recommendation from an immigration lawyer that may analyze your particular state of affairs and advocate enhance your ties to the USA.

U.S. Citizenship

U.S. residents will not be restricted by the identical necessities as lawful everlasting residents. Consequently, residents can get pleasure from longer intervals of journey exterior the USA with none scrutiny from immigration officers. Thus, naturalizing as a U.S. citizen is a standard technique to keep away from inexperienced card abandonment.

When evaluating your software towards the naturalization necessities, USCIS will analyze your steady residence and absences over the earlier 5 years. There shall be a presumption that you just’ve damaged your steady residence requirement for any absence from the U.S. of six months or extra throughout the 5 years previous to submitting Type N-400, Software for Naturalization. Absences of 1 yr or extra will all the time disrupt the continual residence requirement. Sadly, a reentry allow doesn’t defend your steady residence requirement for the needs of naturalization. If a everlasting resident is absent from the USA for one yr or extra, she or he will disrupt the continual residence requirement for naturalization even when she or he traveled with a legitimate reentry allow.

About CitizenPath

CitizenPath supplies easy, inexpensive, step-by-step steering via USCIS immigration functions. People, attorneys and non-profits use the service on desktop or cell system to arrange immigration varieties precisely, avoiding expensive delays. CitizenPath permits customers to attempt the service totally free and supplies a 100% money-back assure that USCIS will approve the applying or petition. We offer help for the Reentry Allow Software (Type I-131), Inexperienced Card Renewal Software (Type I-90), Citizenship Software (Type N-400), and several other different immigration providers.

Word to Reader: This put up was initially printed on August 25, 2017, and has been modified with enhancements.

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