Does unemployment affect the pending petition application? 10 Answers as of January 05, 2012

If there is no income at the time of the interview, you will need to have a new sponsor or joint sponsor sign the affidavit of support on your behalf and provide all the necessary supporting documentation. Without that, your visa will most likely not be granted.

At this stage in your application process ( Initial review) If you have submitted documents that satisfy the sponsor requirements, the issue might not come up at your initial review unless immigration has information outside of that which you have submitted. On the other hand, the interviewer may ask about the status of your husband's employment at the meeting.

No way to be sure but probably since you already submitted the Affidavit of Support and tax information you will be fine. In the meantime let's hope your husband will be successful in landing another job.

I am assuming that the application you are talking about is I -130 family Petition or K Visa( Fiance Visa) I can assure you that your husband losing his job has nothing to do with the processing time. However, the fact that your husband is a Felon may draw attention to the application. What was the nature of his criminal record/ conviction ? The Immigration will send you an RFE, Request for further evidence if they need more documents or additional sponsor. You did not state when this application was actually filed, because it may be delayed due to backlog with the Service, there are thousands of applications of the same nature, and they will get to it. However, you may send a Status Request to the Service Center processing the application asking them to update you about the status of the application. You need to be patient with the Service, sometimes no news is good news, because if you push them too much , they may just deny the application and subject you to more delay. If you have more questions, you may ask but remember to include the type of application, when was it filed, the nature of your husband`s criminal conviction and so on. It will help me more to answer your question.

You will need a co-sponsor. The additional I-864 can be submitted later with your visa application.

My understanding is that they are very strict in the Philippines and would likely not approve the immigrant visa application itself without appropriate financial documents. The immigrant visa PETITION will be approved by USCIS without this information, but the visa is another story.

If he does not make enough, another person can sign off the affidavit of support. If his criminal record does not include a sex crime, it will not affect the petition.

If there is too little income, because of unemployment or for any other reason, the immigration petition will not be approved. The USCIS examining officer has no discretion to make an exception to this rule. If your husband cannot find a co-sponsor, another way to meet the resource requirement is to show that he has assets at a certain level. Since you are married, is it possible that you have assets that you could pool with him to meet this requirement?

You may be required to obtain a co-sponsor. The issue is whether you will become a burden. If the case is in initial review, USCIS has only just started looking into the application. At a later point, you may be requested to submit additional evidence. Depending upon when your interview occurs, you will most likely need to bring updated tax returns. If your husband does not have sufficient income or continues to be on unemployment, it would be best to have a co-sponsor to make sure you are not denied for being unable to meet the support obligations.

Unemployment is counted as income. In your case, it may be needed to find a financial co-sponsor if your husband cannot demonstrate that he makes enough to sponsor you. Also, you mentioned your husband is a felon. There are certain felonies that may prevent him from applying for you. For example under the Adam Walsh Act, person that have committed specified offenses against a minor.