IT IS well-known that marriage to a US citizen, if bona fide, provides a clear path to permanent residency in most cases. But what happens when a US citizen spouse dies prior to the approval of an application for permanent residency? Does the surviving spouse have options? Fortunately they do and under a new policy recently released from US Citizenship and Immigration Services, these options have expanded providing a larger pool of applicants with an opportunity to legalize their status.
If an immigrant marries a US citizen and has been married for more than two years and has not remarried and was not legally separated at the time the citizen (petitioner) passed away he or she may still save their residency. This Widow exception is accomplished by filing a self petition for permanent residency using Form I-360, as long as the petition is filed within 2 years of the passing. However, prior to this recent memo, if you had the same scenario as above but were married for LESS than two years the petition from the US citizen spouse would be automatically revoked and the only way to save it was a process known as a request for Humanitarian Reinstatement.
