Question:
I just got my green card last July, and I am going to visit my home
country (Indonesia) for the first time since I got my card later this
week.
My question is: do I have to go to the US Embassy for some reason (like
get my passport stamped)? Some of my friend said I should, some said I
don't have to.
Answer:
Don't ask for trouble. They may take your green card away from you.
A knit pick, perhaps, but if you have a GC, then you are a US permanent
resident. Doesn't that then make the US your home country? After all,
you are supposed to now permanently reside in the States.
The answer, Benjamin, is that if you will be gone less than six months, you don't need
to have any kind of returning documentation other than your GC. Technically you don't
even need a passport or travel document, although many third countries will require one
for visa purposes.
I'm not sure he did. Never one to do nationistic rants, I think I may
step out of character for a minute: I think this reflects an attitude
many people seem to have about PR status. It is supposed to mean someone
has decided to make the States their home. The way a lot of people
around here seem to few it as a way to assure the right to work in the
States while still having their old country as home. Why the heck else
would we have people constantly wanting advice on how to maintain PR
status while not actually living in the States?
BTW, was PR status truly meant to be a permanent status, or was it meant
to be a step on the road to citizenship?
When I was traveling to my home country a year ago, I called INS and
they told me one MUST have valid passport and greencard to return to US.
I don't get that feeling Brad, although there are certainly some who simply want PR as a
way to get easy entry to the US when they feel like it.
I am not an immigrant. I am US-born. But my grandparents, who were immigrants in
1916 and are now long-time permanent residents, still think of China as "laojia" -- the
"mother country." There are sentimental attachments to the country, the culture, and
the memories of friends and relatives there. These attachments are not, in my view,
inconsistent with the idea that their home, meaning the place where they live now, where
their possessions are, where they return after traveling, is in the US.
The concept of permanent residence does not carry with it any obligations of allegiance.
Permanent residence means domicile, in the sense of where one's permanent physical home
is. A PR is naturally obliged to obey all of our laws (as are alien visitors to this
country, with the possible exception of those with diplomatic immunity), but nothing in
the grant of PR requires the alien to consider the US "home" in any sense other than the
physical domicile.
If I decided to move to Ireland because I got a great job offer there, or because I
married an Irish who didn't want to leave her native country, then I might become a
landed immigrant (permanent resident) of Ireland, and make my physical, long-term,
nontemporary home there. But my allegiance would still be to the USA, and I would think
of myself as an American. That would not be inconsistent with PR in Ireland.
In terms of PR as an interim step to citizenship -- I don't think Congress thought of it
that way. What Congress clearly thought was that we should not grant citizenship to
aliens until they had been PRs for some period of time and had the opportunity to adopt
our culture, language, and to understand our way of life, and to prove by a track record
of not being a public charge, committing crimes, becoming addicted to drugs, etc. that
they deserved to be citizens. (And, because aliens must pass these tough tests to
become citizens, FBI statistics show that naturalized citizens commit far fewer crimes
than native-born citizens. Having had to wait for and study the privileges and
obligations of citizenship, aliens who become citizens actually become some of our best
citizens.)
But, although Congress clearly intended that we not grant citizenship to aliens without
first requiring a period of PR, there is nothing in the legislative history to suggest
that the _purpose_ of PR is to serve as some kind of probationary period for
citizenship. We don't force any aliens to become citizens (although recent welfare
reform changes have had that effect indirectly) because we want them to accept
citizenship knowingly and voluntarily.
I believe that the root of the problem is indeed in the meaning of "green
card". The USA makes the green card very difficult because it is assumed
to be the main step on the road to citizenship. That is why the INS starts
by assuming that any and every alien coming to the States has immigration
intent. It is up to the alien to prove otherwise.
In most other countries (e.g., Western Europe), the "green card" has a
lower status as a "residence permit" [note that I have not said
"_permanent_ residence permit"]. As such it is much easy to obtain. On the
other hand, it is not assumed to be a step on the road to citizenship. The
difficult step is to get the citizenship: only a few legal residents ever
get the citizenship of the host country, even after applying many times.
This discrepancy is reflected in the attitude of many aliens in the Sates.
They are forced to get "more" that they would like. They just want a
"residence permit", but they are forced to fight for "permanent
residence". Once obtained, it is hard to give it up since it took so much
to get it. I suspect that many green card holders end up permanently in
the States because it is "expensive" to give the green card up after so
much effort.
The USA would be much better off shifting part of the difficulty from the
green card to the citizenship, and making the green card more a residence
permit with no connections to eventual citizenship.
This is just my opinion and is not legal advice.
8 CFR 211.2 states, "A passport valid for the bearer's entry into a foreign country for
at least 60 days beyond the expiration of this [sic] immigrant visa shall be presented
by each immigrant except an immigrant who is . . . (c) returning to an unrelinquished
lawful permanent residence in the United States after a temporary absence abroad."
Absences of less than six months are presumed to be temporary. Therefore, a permanent
resident returning after an absence of six months or less should be admitted even if
that person does not have a passport.
This doesn't mean I wouldn't advise carrying a passport. Of course you should. But I
believe the problem was that the original poster didn't have a valid passport and
couldn't get one in time for the trip, and my response was that although technically he
didn't need one to re-enter the U.S. if gone for less than six months, he should get one
because some third countries might require it for entry.
What I don't understand is why the U.S. makes it difficult for
a P.R. to reside abroad for a few years, and then return to
reside again in the U.S.
Why should the U.S. care if someone wants to go back and forth
as much as they want? No one cares if someone lives a few years
in New York, then California, etc. Why not view travel between,
say, the U.S. and France in the same way?
As we near the end of the last decade of the Twentieth Century,
why can't someone be a citizen of the world?
I don't like the whole nationalistic concept. All people have the same
strengths and weaknessness. The whole earth is our home, and I'm tired
of saying "freedom" with many qualifications. There is no real freedom
until the whole earth is free.
That, or the right to live in the US to visit relatives while still having
their old country as home.
Or their conformance to US law that they are required to obey, while still
trying to keep in touch with their real family or job or property in other
countries that they really didn't want to leave.
Because PR status is expensive and cumbersome to obtain, would be even more
difficult to obtain a second time, and is illegal to abandon by plan. The
tourist visa or other non-immigrant visa that they really wanted, because
they really wanted to return home, is less cumbersome in procedure but is
rarely granted. They are *forced* to take US PR, but they might still have
some attachment to their home country.
Both. Why is this an issue? Is your university status truly meant to
provide education or a step on the road to income?
