Hey friends, it's Latoya McBean-Pompy.
The question in this video is, how much money do you need to actually make, in order to
sponsor your spouse?
That's what we're going to tackle, stay tuned.
Friends, I'm so excited to be in your living room, in your car, wherever you are, you're
at the gym.
I'm with you as you're watching this video.
Thanks so much for watching it.
I so appreciate it.
I want to also thank you guys for signing up for Smart Immigration Academy.
We started on January 1st, it's going great so far.
It's so excited to finally get to know you, and to hear your stories, and to come alongside
you and teach you some more things through the Academy.
So thanks very much guys for signing up.
Now, about this question, we're going to tackle an issue that comes up every single time a
person files for their spouse.
This is a very common issue, and it's an issue about money.
It's an issue about whether you have enough resources to satisfy our government, that
you can meet that threshold, that income threshold to take care of your spouse when he or she
gets a green card.
Because as you guys know, you've been following a lot of the discussions around public charge.
Our government is very concerned about the fact that people who immigrate to the United
States, may become a public charge, or they may go on public benefits within the first
five years of being here.
And so there's a strong push to curtail that.
And it's too aggressive, but all of this is being debated in the court room as we speak.
Really, it's being litigated.
So I'm going to set public charge aside for a moment, and focus only on the affidavit
of support income requirements.
So let's back up and start from the beginning.
When you petition for your spouse, whether your spouse is here in America, and you're
going through the adjustment of status process, or you're going through the consular process,
through the National Visa Center.
And then your spouse will be working with the embassy, the US embassy in his or her
country.
So whether you're doing one of those two processes, you still have to submit an affidavit of support.
Every petitioner has to submit an affidavit of support.
And that's the I-864 affidavit of support form.
That form requires you to disclose to the government what your current income is, and
what your total income was for the past three years.
The government also wants you to submit to them for the most recent taxed year.
So you have to submit that evidence as well.
So if you don't meet the income threshold friends, you're not eligible to petition for
this individual.
So what do you do?
Well, you get a joint sponsor, find someone, a US citizen, or a green card holder who meets
the income threshold, and who can sponsor your partner.
Now, what you should know is that the affidavit of support friends, is a contract between
you and the government.
And that contract says that you're going to be financially responsible for your spouse
for the next 10 years, or up until the point when he or she naturalizes, when they become
a citizen.
As you smart folks know, when you obtain the green card, or a lawful permanent residency
through your spouse, you're eligible to file for naturalization three years after, after
becoming a lawful permanent resident.
So once your spouse naturalizes at that point, you're off the hook.
Going back to the affidavit of support friends, the income requirement is based on our federal
poverty guidelines.
And your annual income must be a minimum of 125% of our federal poverty guidelines.
And the government has this really cool table on its website, and I also have a chart that
you can download.
I'm going to make it available.
Just download it, click on the link below, and pull up this chart.
And it'll tell you what your income should be if you're looking to sponsor your spouse,
but if you do not meet this income threshold, as I've mentioned before, you could always
get a joint sponsor.
This whole income requirement friends, is based on your household size.
The first question you need to ask yourself is, how many people are part of my household?
How many people am I responsible for?
In other words, do I have any dependents, any children?
Yes, you need to indicate that on that affidavit of support.
And you also need to check one for your husband, you're married or you check one for yourself.
You include yourself, your husband and your children.
And so you count the number of people who are part of your household size, and then
you look at that table and you say, well, there's four people that's part of my household.
Therefore I must make a minimum of $32,187.
As of the filming of this video friends, the 2019 income requirements are still on USCIS'
website.
I have not seen the 2020 numbers yet.
Each year they do update it.
So the 2020 numbers are not out yet, but at the 2019 numbers say, that if you're a household
size of four, you must make a minimum of 32,187.
If you're just a household size of two, meaning you and your spouse who you're petitioning
for, then you must meet an income of $21,137.
If your family size is seven, your income must be a minimum of 48,762.
And so guys download this chart, or you could also go on USCIS' website and see what those
guidelines are.
So as I've mentioned earlier, if you do not meet this, you must get a joint sponsor, and
you've got to make sure that, that joint sponsor's household size also supports this.
Let's say you want to use your sister, and your sister has like five kids, and then your
sister is sponsoring your husband.
That would put her family size at seven.
The sister, the five kids, and then your husband.
So that's a family size of seven.
So she must be earning a minimum of 48,762 in order for that to work.
And then obviously if she's married, then that's another person, that's part of her
household.
So be careful about who you choose.
Make sure you choose people who are eligible, meaning that they have the right status, US
citizen or green card holder.
And they have a household size that supports this income requirement.
That's really important as well.
That's what I want to share with you in this shorter video, about how much you actually
need to make in order to sponsor your spouse.
So download this table as I've said before, sign up for my emails, because each week I
send out really good information to my email list.
And just stay plugged in and comment below.
Tell me if you have any questions about this content that I've shared in this video, or
about anything else that you'd like for me to cover.
Happy to read your questions and see whether I can cover them in another video.
Friends.
Thanks for watching this, and I will see you in the next one.
Bye bye.