Alright, this has been the other question we have been getting a lot on our YouTube channel
and our Facebook group. We're just seeing this question floating around a lot so we wanted to
provide you with clarity on whether or not the CR1 spousal petitions are high priority.
What I mean by that is the question that we're getting is K1 fiancé visas
have been designated as high priority. What about CR1 spouse visas? Are they high priority too?
Are they being ignored? What's going on with my I-130 petition, my CR1 visa application?
To give you a little bit of background, if you're not currently in this
process, the CR1 is the spouse visa. It's for individuals who are married to United States
citizens or lawful permanent residents. The K1 fiancé visa is for individuals
who are engaged to a United States citizen.
To give you some background, earlier in the year there was a
presidential proclamation suspending the entry of certain individuals from entering into the
United States. That proclamation had certain exceptions and among those exceptions were
exceptions for individuals who are married to a United States citizen and going through the
CR1 process. The issue with the proclamation that was announced earlier in the year
is that-let me make sure everybody can still
hear me. I don't want to lose anybody. The issue was that
that proclamation that was announced didn't actually provide any clarity or specifications for
the K1 fiancé visa. There was a lot of uncertainty at US embassies and consulates
about whether or not fiancé visas were allowed to be scheduled for interviews.
The reality was they weren't scheduling interviews anyway because
of COVID. But long story short, the issue was the presidential proclamation
didn't provide any clarity about whether or not the K1 visa was an exception
to be allowed for individuals to be scheduled for interviews and to enter the United States.
There was an announcement in August of this year that clarified or later in the summer that
clarified fiancé visas are also an exception.
They can still be scheduled for interviews. What happened in August though was that
an official announcement was made saying that the K1 visa is considered high priority. This was done
because there was so much confusion over the original proclamation about whether or not
K1s were included. They had to make this specific announcement saying,
the Department of State made the announcement US embassies and consulates
yes, you can actually be scheduling K1 visas for interviews and they should be considered
high priority. The question that people are asking though because that special
announcement was made for fiancé visas and not for CR1s, there's a lot of confusion that
individuals who are going through the I-130 process because they're married to a United
States citizen or lawful permanent resident that they are somehow not considered priority.
The reality is that they are too even though there hasn't been a specific announcement saying
that CR1 spousal petitions are high priority. They are.
The short answer is they're not prioritizing fiancé visas over marriage petitions and they're not
prioritizing marriage-based cases CR1s over K1s. The US embassies and consulates
are trying to prioritize everyone and the first priority is individuals who had interviews that
were canceled getting those rescheduled and then they will go down the line. Unfortunately, as many
of you know, a lot of US embassies and consulates are closed or they have limited interviews.
The pain point is that even though CR1s and K1s can be scheduled for an interview, there's
just limited interview availability. Hopefully, that provides clarity to let you know that
CR1s aren't being considered higher priority than K1s and K1s aren't being considered higher
priority than CR1s. They're all of equal priority. Immigration just loves to throw out certain terms
like that and it just causes extra confusion. Hopefully, that provides clarity.