Friend moving to USA with US citizen DH and US citizen baby on ESTA

[esta2024]

Asking all british spouses of US citizens.

My friend has decided to go to the USA with her American husband and baby on an ESTA (they were living abroad for years, baby born abroad), live with family while remote working for her current employer (not a US employer and money paid to overseas bank account), and on day 91 apply to adjust her status to a green card.

based on what i have read online, it is likely to succeed despite the fact that she would be overstaying on esta but it seems to have succeeded for many people as they are married to american citizens and in bona fide relationships and its difficult to establish intent to immigrate from the onset (as people say they are just visiting and then 'changed' their minds).

is this true, I can't quite get my head around this. Why doesn't everyone just do this and they wait 1-1.5 years for consular processing? I understand that by doing it this way, you give up all rights to appeal and if it goes wrong, you would be deported and banned from the USA.

His company is American so presumably they would transfer him over.

He said he was fine cos he works for an American company

Just checked federal poverty guidelines in his state for a family of 3 and its pretty low-25k. So 125% would be 32k plus.

That should be achievable though no idea who can survive on that. It would be hard enough in England!

It is barely possible to survive on poverty level income.

He should aim far higher.

Has he considered this? He seems very laid back about his income.

Why not apply for a bona fide transfer to the US to work for his company, so the company would raise his income immediately?

Was MIL the driver of the apparently hasty decision to move?
Is MIL the source of the information they are relying on wrt USCIS? You say that MIL had always talked about signing an affidavit...

All I know is that he has secured an agreement with his company to work remotely..his company hq is in new York which is nowhere near his mum's home. So why would they pay him much more to work remotely, doesn't make sense.

I believe it was the desire to live closer to family and they have been planning it since 2022 which was when I first heard of the idea to move back home.

They should pay him more to work in the US, where average salaries are higher. Remote work makes no difference. Remote workers in the US are paid the going rate for their industry and role regardless of remote working. They're getting a massive bargain if they're paying him rates that would be acceptable in many places abroad.

Does his job come with health insurance? A 401k? If not, he needs to start talking to his employer as soon as possible to renegotiate his compensation package. His salary and benefits need to align with the going rate for his role in the US, not wherever he was working outside the US.

If he was planning it since 2022, he should have realised that the way he's going about it is unusual and carries with it a risk. He should have gone about it differently.

I am really not super clear on his pay situation..it could be that he is getting a payrise..but he has no health insurance as they are figuring it out when they get there.

If you get health insurance outside of work you need a pretty massive pay rise to pay for that..

The company is legally obliged to offer him health insurance unless it’s really small, which it doesn’t sound like it is.

If he’s really on a very low income he can also look at buying a heavily subsidized policy through the healthcare exchange. Of course he can’t put his wife on that while she’s on an ESTA, but once she becomes a resident then she should be able to be added.

Depending on the state their low income could qualify them for Medicaid, especially the baby. Although those low COL states are ironically the ones least likely to have expanded Medicaid to those who most need it.

It has 41 employees. That is pretty small in my book.

Also read re the ACA: Currently, the limit is set at 50 or more full-time employees.

Which is why he is figuring it out once he gets there.

So he needs to look at the other two options I listed.

I don't think the wife can't go on Medicaid until she has a Green Card.
The I-864 means the person or people signing have financial obligations.

I can't believe a man who has been planning to move back to the US since 2022 has made no approach to his company about a payraise, and has not considered the health insurance situation - in fact he has made no moves at all in financial terms to give his wife and child a legally or financially stable life in the US. The wife had better not fall pregnant.

What is she doing for health insurance? You have to have legal residency to qualify under any plan. There is a short-term plan for people who arrive on a visa and have not yet sorted out their health insurance but you can’t even get that if you came in on an ESTA.

She will be deported for good if this does not work with no possibility of appeal. This was all such an incredibly bad idea

I don't want to say too much about the circumstances that i believe made them move so quickly as it is too outing. He keeps saying it's financial rather than running away but stuff has happened to the country recently (and yesterday)he used to live in that would make any mumsnetter move though it was unlikely they would be in mortal danger. If you knew the country he was moving from, he would probably be judged less harshly. Also not really relevant, I doubt US immigration would take that into consideration for a spouse visa!

However what is true is that he told me in 2022 was one option he was considering was moving back to his mother's home. One reason the legal marriage in 2019 was in the usa was for immigration purposes!

She is using the catastrophic insurance plan on her current insurance

Thinking more about it, if he applies for anything like subsidized health insurance or Medicaid for himself and the baby, they are going to (again) have to choose whether to report the income she is gaining by working illegally, or choose not to report it which would get them into even deeper legal shit.

Most insurance policies only cover you for trips abroad up to 1 month in length (even if it's an annual policy). What is she going to after she has been in the US for a month? Or does her insurance plan allow her to be overseas for longer?

Assuming he gets health insurance through work cos he got a new job, can he insure a wife who isn't living there legally yet and has only applied for a visa?

It’s up to the insurer to decide. Does she have a Social Security Number?

I recently signed my family up to my work insurance and they wanted everyone’s SSN along with stuff like DOB and addresses.

BTW I have a British friend who brought her parents over to the US using the method of coming in on an ESTA then applying for adjustment of status, and it did work.

They had to live in limbo for quite a while, and during that period they couldn’t work, and they had to buy private insurance - and this was before the ACA, when private insurance was allowed to refuse to cover pre-existing conditions.

It was stressful.

No, her husband would have to present her documentation to show she is legal to his HR department so she can be added to his existing policy. Whatever insurance she has at the moment almost certainly isn’t valid. I would personally be shitting it being in the states and uninsured.

I bet everything works out for her in the end! It always does for these kinda people - by that I mean the ones that seem to blindly go along with things, with no awareness of the proper process, or the consequences should things go wrong and never listen to anyones advice. Yet, they seem to go with it anyway, with no stress and in the end everything is ok!!

I think it would work out but potentially be very expensive e.g. if she has to see doctor without insurance or if it takes a long time to process cos its not straightforward (she is then basically trapped on her remote job on a non usa salary which would be eroded since costs in the usa are so high)

Their main point of going to usa is to save up money for their future through living with family but as someone who has done that, if you aren't on a great salary, you need to keep your costs low and have a decent income for it to make an iota of difference as homes/rent require a lot of money even in low col states.they might be living at home for years

Uninsured, a baby and lowish income isn't a great combination esp when usa inflation is high.

It does sound tough.

But she's not making their life any easier by planning to work illegally while on the ESTA. If she doesn't do that, and they manage to get her into the country, then I think they'd have a chance of eventually getting her status adjusted. It's going to be long-drawn and expensive, but at least that way they aren't breaking any laws.

The alternative might be for him to move to the US and start the visa application process, and her to return to her home country (the UK?) with the baby, work remotely there until her spousal visa has been processed, then move legally to the US without having broken any laws. But they'd be looking at living apart for around 18 months. This is what a lot of people just have to do.

I’ve been in this position, albeit without a baby which must make everything doubly difficult, but I applied for a spousal visa (actually he applied for it as that’s how it works) and it took a year from filing to me actually getting the visa and immigrating to the US. We were able to visit each other whilst this was going on, so that helped. The time apart was not ideal but we did it all properly and it was well worth it in the end. Along the way we had a lot of bad advice from actual immigration lawyers who were not up-to-date on the changed rules, so I really wouldn’t rely on anything they say. They are generally not interested in straightforward cases like mine and yours and rarely deal with them, hence their lack of knowledge.

Just remember that if coming in on an ESTA and applying for residence whilst you’re here does not work, there is no right to appeal and you must leave the US for good. If you are found to be working, you will get kicked out anyway. As part of your application, they will want to see evidence of how you are supporting yourselves as a family and that will include bank accounts overseas which will presumably show your salary being paid. Your husband will also need to file taxes and declare your income, even if you don’t need to pay tax on it because you do elsewhere.

It’s all just a really bad idea. Sorry OP.

My friend is already in the usa. Its not me lol, I live in the uk ..

Out of curiosity why do you need to submit overseas bank statements. You could just show your American bank account statements...

The husband is American so needs to declare ALL income globally as he has a tax liability on any income, not just US derived income. Given they've been not been living in the US until recently, of course they will be asked for overseas bank accounts.