USCIS Updates Guidance and Clarifies Policy on Family-Based Conditional Permanent Residence

Key changes

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services is updating guidance on family-based conditional permanent residence in its Policy Manual. The update consolidates and updates guidance on eligibility, filing, and adjudication for Form I-751, Petition to Remove Conditions on Residence .

The update clarifies what aliens must do to change the basis of filing in cases of waivers based on battery or extreme cruelty. It also clarifies that if an alien’s conditional permanent resident status is terminated for failing to timely file Form I-751, they may be eligible to adjust permanent resident status on a new basis. This is true even if USCIS issues a notice of termination of conditional permanent resident status before the alien files Form I-485, Application to Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status .

Under the Immigration Marriage Fraud Amendments of 1986, an alien obtains permanent resident status on a conditional basis for two years if:

They obtain permanent resident status based on marriage; and

That marriage began less than two years before they obtain that status.

To remove the conditions on their permanent resident status, conditional permanent residents generally must file Form I-751 within the 90-day period before the two-year anniversary of when they obtained conditional permanent resident status.