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J-1 Hardship Waiver for Egyptian Client with Government Funding

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The facts about this case:

  • Client has two United States citizen children.
  • The older of the two children had RSV and a medical history of respiratory illness.
  • That child receives medical care multiple times each year.
  • In the United States the family has excellent health insurance coverage via client’s employer which they would lose if the family relocated to Egypt.

The Ranchod Law Group argued exceptional medical hardship because of this and because conditions in Egypt would aggravate the child’s health.

This problem is also compounded by the unavailability of medical care and medications in Egypt.

We also made additional hardship arguments due to:

  • the dangerous conditions in Egypt including terrorism and kidnapping;
  • the exceptional financial hardship which would accompany relocation to Egypt as relevant to the children;
  • the severe educational deficiencies in Egypt;
  • the language barrier;
  • emotional/mental health hardship to the children;

among other hardships.

The case was approved in a year and three months.

Additional information and other success stories about I-612 Waivers:

J1 Hardship Waiver for Brazil Approved

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Hi this is Kaushik Ranchod from The Ranchod Law Group here, coming to you live, and today we’re going to talk about J-1 Visa hardship waivers.

We’re talking about just how we got this Waiver approved for a client from Brazil!

A word on what you have been waiting for.

First of all I want to give you an update – it’s taking 19 to 21 months to get an approval, now that’s in July 2019: crazy times but that’s what it is, so don’t wait because we get too many people who call us when it’s too late.

What you’ve been waiting for:

How did this Waiver get approved?

Well we got this J-1 Visa hardship waiver approved because they’re from Brazil – a national from Brazilmarried to a United States citizen and he has a career, long standing career, here in the United States with a very well-known company… he had to give all of that up if he went to Brazil – now who wants to give up that! You work here all your life, you work hard and then, because you marry someone with the two-year rule you have to leave?

Well USCIS agreed with us, we made a legal argument about that: you know tighten all of the facts and what not, arguing career hardship and also the financial obligations. Also, they had gone through separation before and they didn’t want to go through that again – who wants to be separated for two years of their life: that basically disrupts everything in the United States!

If you’re on a J-1 Visa, you know that if you’re here, you know I need an I-601 waiver, then you know that too, and the requirements are very similar although there are some differences with those two so bottom line is call us at (916) 613-3553 to see if you qualify because it just depends on a bunch of factors. There’s not one factor that makes or breaks a case typically – typically it’s the totality of circumstances:

  • it’s the financial hardship
  • it’s the career hardship
  • maybe it’s a health issue
  • maybe it’s the political situation that’s going on with the country at the time as well

In Brazil, you know, there is a lot of crime as well so there are issues specific to Brazil as well that also helped with the J-1 Visa waiver. So every case is different of course, that depends on what country you are from.

I invite you to ask any questions and tune in next Thursday for our next live show on immigration and your questions.

Thank you have an awesome day – bye for now.

Additional information on the subject of J-1 Visas:

J Waiver Approval for a Brazilian national married to a U.S. citizen

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I-612 Approval Notice




More good news on the J Waiver front! Our client, a Brazilian national, is married to a United States citizen who was working towards his master’s degree, who had a long-standing career with a well-known company, and who ran a small business on the side. With all of these things going on, he had a lot to lose if he had to relocate to Brazil for two years to be with his wife. We argued that because of his ties to the U.S. —including financial obligations— that relocation would impose exceptional hardship; we also highlighted unfavorable conditions in Brazil like high crime and prevalence of communicable diseases that would add to the hardship.

What was interesting in this case was that the two had already experienced separation, so the United States citizen husband, despite all of the hardship, was not willing to remain behind while his wife was in Brazil for two years.

During their short separation, he engaged in unhealthy coping mechanisms which affected his work. Luckily, she was able to return and prevent him from financial ruin. USCIS issued an onerous RFE which The Ranchod Law Group was able to successfully overcome.

Additional information and other success stories about I-612 Waivers:

The consequences of having domestic violence on your record

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Welcome back to The Ranchod Law Group Crimmigration blog!

Today we are going to discuss domestic violence.

As with any conviction, having domestic violence on your record can be very costly. Not only are there court fees to pay, but first-time offenders often have to enroll in 52 weeks of classes for anything from parenting to anger management. These classes can disrupt your routine or work schedule and missing even a single class can result in failed probation or jail time.

And then of course there are immigration consequences of domestic violence. One important consequence of a domestic violence crime is that it makes someone deportable, even if they have a green card.

The first thing to keep in mind is that not all domestic violence crimes are treated equally for immigration purposes. For example, in California, “spousal battery” and “corporal injury to a spouse” are two different types of domestic violence – but only one makes you deportable!

Deportable crimes of domestic violence are found under Section 237 of the Immigration and Nationality Act.

They apply to everyone – people with DACA, green cards, other types of visas like H1-B, or no legal status at all.

Another consequence is that committing domestic violence can delay someone’s ability to apply for Citizenship for up to 5 years. This is true even when there is only an arrest and no criminal conviction. In most cases, applicants for United States citizenship, through a process known as naturalization, must maintain 5 years of good moral character before applying. During this crucial 5-year period, even an arrest that does not lead to a conviction can result in denial.

Finally, some domestic violence convictions can lead to Deportation without bail. This is a law known as mandatory detention and applies to some domestic violence crimes with a jail or prison sentence of a year or more. Sometimes, the best strategy for immigrants is to plead to a crime and avoid a lengthy sentence. This is true even if the sentence is suspended during completion of probation.

Mandatory detention can lead to years behind bars awaiting Deportation – even after the sentence given by the criminal court for the crime. For this reason, it is important to have a crimmigration attorney on your side to let you know all the possible consequences of a plea, even some that won’t happen until years later.
If you or a loved one faces a domestic violence charge, consult a crimmigration attorney right away who can let you know all the possible consequences of a plea.

Additional information on the subject domestic violence:

ICE raids, What to do and What You Need to Know

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Hi this is Kaushik Ranchod from The Ranchod Law Group with Brian for our weekly immigration show and today the hot topic is the ICE raids that are going on.

If you have questions you can contact us at (916) 613-3553 so there have been a lot of ICE raids recently and we are getting a lot of calls about what to do so that’s what this video is gonna be about.

So if an ICE officer does come to your door they can only open the door in two situations:

  1. Do they have consent? That means do you allow them to enter? And if you allow them then in by opening your door up and say they can come in.
  2. Reason number two would be if there’s an order that would allow them to enter. So they would need to have an actual order that allows them to enter.

If you are not in one of those two situations, then they cannot enter and you can refuse entry.

If you have questions you can contact us at (916) 613-3553

So we talked about two reasons right now:

  • one if you open the door and let them in or if they have an order that allows them to enter;
  • otherwise if you say you don’t want them to enter they’re not allowed to enter;

We also give to our clients something called a red card where you can slide this under the door informing the officer that you don’t want them to enter unless they have an order and if you’d like to get that free from us you can contact us at (916) 613-3553 and we’d be happy to give that to you.

I want to thank you so much for joining today and we will see you next week thank you and have an awesome day.

Additional information on ICE:

I-612 hardship waiver approval success story and approval letter

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I-612 Application to waive foreign residence requirements




The latest success story to come out of The Ranchod Law Group belongs to a Pakistani national for whom we filed a Waivers of the two-year home residency requirement based on exceptional hardship to his United States citizen wife. By working closely with the clients, we were able to successfully demonstrate that his wife would suffer exceptional hardship if he were to move back to Pakistanfor two years. We highlighted the fact that due to her recurrent major depressive episodes coupled with chronic pain, that being without her husband for two years was simply not an option as she would suffer medical hardships. Our argument explaining why she could not relocate was airtight as well. The husband is Pakistani and Muslim, while his United States citizen wife is a white, Christian woman. This kind of arrangement would already be socially frowned up in Pakistan, but adding to the exceptional hardship was the fact that the husband already had an arranged marriage, per local custom. Upon breaking that arranged marriage, our client effectively made himself and his family a target. Therefore, we were able to successfully argue that their lives would be in danger upon relocation to Pakistan. It is work mentioning that the case was approved without a Request for Evidence (RFE); in today’s climate, that is a huge feat!

Additional information and other success stories about I-612 Waivers:

Pakistan Citizen J1 Hardship Waiver Approved

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Hi this is Kaushik Ranchod here today from The Ranchod Law Group and what we are talking about is J-1 Visa Waivers and exceptional hardship waivers.

Recently we just got an approval for someone a Client from Pakistanand I’m going to tell you how we did it.

So when you apply for a J-1 Visa Waiver the biggest mistake that I’m still seeing is people are waiting too long. Right now it is taking anywhere from eighteen and a half to two years to get a Waiver and these times are changing all the time. But specifically:

how we got this approved

Every case is unique and in this situation the Pakistani spouse was Christian and he was Muslim. So if she would have went back to Pakistan, their lives could have been endangered because of that relationship. And so that was one factor that we talked about. So in the J-1 exceptional hardship Waiver you need to demonstrate hardship if you’re separated and hardship if you or your spouse, who is the US citizen remains in the US while you go back, or if your spouse joins you, also have to show extreme hardship.

So what’s the hardship I just talked about?

It was in the event you should both return to your home country. Another way that we demonstrated the hardship was because if the US citizen were to remain in the United States she had also a history of depression and that depression would be exacerbated. So with both of those factors we were able to get a J-1 hardship waiver approval without an RFE and in today’s day and age that is very significant because USCIS is issuing a lot RFEs for J-1 Waivers. Every case is unique so just because we’ve got this case approved doesn’t mean that your case would be approved, but contact our office at (916) 613-3553 so we can evaluate your situation and see if you qualify to apply for a J-1 exceptional hardship Waiver.

These cases require a lot of work to demonstrate the exceptional hardship: you write a legal brief explaining the hardship because it’s more than just mere separation and so it requires more than just filling out the form. We believe it needs a legal argument especially in this day and age with the Trump Administration so that’s why we prepare a legal brief.

If you have questions you can call us at (916) 613-3553 and we look forward to seeing you next week we will not be here Thursday because I is the fourth of July so we will talk to you next Friday – Thank you and have an awesome day.

Related Information on J-1 Hardship Waivers

Marriage Green Card Interview Tips You need to Hear

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Hi this is Kaushik Ranchod from The Ranchod Law Group and I’m here with Brian. Today we are talking about marriage green card interviews part 2. So Brian, what kind of questions have we been getting? The question is how early should someone arrive to the interview? I know in the notice it says 30 minutes before but is it accurate right now? That’s a great question! Well a lot of things are changing you know very frequently with the Trump administration, so before you know 30 minutes were fine but I would recommend an hour because it’s taking so long right now as of June 2019 to go through security, so you should be there an hour ahead of time just to make sure that you have plenty of time for security – and at that security check what will they check?

So you want to make sure you have your government ID and your interview notice. You should also bring your passport to the interview as well. So you know it’s important then, in that situation, to speak with who’s in charge because with a lot of new trainings going on, you want to think of the security as like going to
the airport through that type of security – that’s what the security is like now.

Once you get to the appointment what kind of question will they ask in the marriage based interview?

For a marriage-based green card they can ask questions such as:

  • How did you meet?
  • What was the date of your marriage?

Those are a couple of common questions that they ask.

Is there any way they can ask something that you don’t know? Something crazy?

Uh yes they can! They can ask something that you don’t know and sometimes you know you’re not gonna know every single fact about your spouse so don’t worry
about that – it’s the majority of questions as long as you know the majority of questions it should be fine but if there’s a lot of questions that you don’t know then that’s gonna raise a red flag, but you’re not going to know every single thing about your spouse so if you all of a sudden can’t remember something don’t let that derail the rest of your interview.

Finally: why is so important to have an attorney present in that interview?

well now with the current President Trump administration I highly recommend that you have an attorney go with you to the interview because they can ask questions there which are inappropriate and you want to have the attorney there to intervene in that situation and if your case for whatever reason is denied, then you also have the attorney there who is a witness to what happened just in case the officer in the decision misconstrues the facts of what occurred: you have the attorney who was there as a witness to know exactly what happened and to clarify the actual testimony that occurred

All right well we want to thank you for joining today and we will see you next week – we want to wish you an awesome day.

Related Information on Green Cards

¿Qué tipos de exenciones I601 están siendo aprobadas?

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Hola, soy Kaushik Ranchod, aqui con Brian. Hoy vamos a hablar de lo que estamos aprobando ahora. Sobre las Exenciones I-601, porque como saben, con la administración del Presidente Trump se está volviendo mucho más difícil que estos casos sean aprobados. En general, la tasa de negación ha incrementado un 40%.

Nuestra firma aún está por encima del 90% de aprobaciones en términos generales. Pero los casos que se están aprobando (y claro que tengo que decirlo aun cuando nuestros casos están siendo aprobados), no quiere decir que todos nuestros casos serán aprobados en el futuro. Es por eso que es tan importante evaluar cada factor específico y único y usted puede llamarnos al 916-613-3553 si tiene preguntas.

En la Exención I-601A para la que acabamos de obtener aprobación, de lo que hablamos en esta situación es que usted debe demostrar, para una Exención por perjuicio excepcional I-601A, un perjuicio excepcional para el ciudadano de los United States si estuvieran separados o si el ciudadano de los estados Unidos tuviera que ir al país de origen del esposo. Una cosa que hemos demostrado es el historial de trauma psicológico que el ciudadano de los Estados Unidos había tenido y cómo podría continuar ocurriendo e incluso aumentar significativamente debido a la separación.

A eso se le conoce como perjuicio psicológico.

Segundo, hablamos acerca de perjuicio financiero, por el hecho de que la pareja tenía un hogar y podían perderlo si el cónyuge tuviera que ir a México.

Adicionalmente, el cuidado de los niños se volvería tan costoso que no serían capaces de pagar por el: ese es otro argumento que establecimos.

Entonces juntamos todos estos factores para demostrar el perjuicio excepcional. En muchos de nuestros casos no hay UN solo factor que en sí mismo constituya un perjuicio excepcional, pero cuando combinamos todos estos factores ¡BOOM! ¡Podemos demostrar perjucio excepcional!

Hay un factor importante que dejé fuera, que es la condición de salud del cónyuge, que también fue un factor importante en el perjuicio excepcional.

Es muy importante recordar al presentar el caso para las exenciones de prejuicio excepcional:

  • Proveer una gran cantidad de registros médicos. Esto es porue no puede simplemente inventar cosas, sino que necesita respaldarlo con evidencia.
  • Crear un informe legal muy extenso con atención a los detalles, describiendo todos los factores y vinculándolos con un argumento legal que demuestre el perjuicio excepcional y cómo a través de la totalidad de las circunstancias, todos los factores crean un perjuicio excepcional.

Bueno, queremos agradecerles por sintonizarnos, pueden dejar sus comentarios en la parte de abajo y nosotros les responderemos en nuestro siguiente programa o podemos responder a sus preguntas en la parte de abajo o pueden llamarnos al (916) 613-3553 o (209) 219-2377.

¡Gracias y que tengan un excelente dia!

Información relacionada I-601A aprobaciones