Frequently Asked Questions On Immigration
Bringing An Adopted Child Here
Q.
I am trying to bring my adopted child here. She is 10 years old. My lawyer says that I ham
to live the child for two years I can file for her. How can this happen while I Hve here
and she is in Ghana?
A. If your adopted child is an orphan, and you are a U.S. citizen, you may be
able to immediately petition for her. If not, your only hope is to get the INS to grant
her humanitarian parole. Then she could join you here and you could meet the law's
two-year "actual custody" requirement for adopted children.
In the "orphan child" category, the law does not require actual custody. Your
child is an orphan, if her parents are deceased, they've abandoned her, or she has a sole
parent, and that parent is unable to care for her. To petition for.an orphan child, you
must be a U.S. cifizen and married, be over 25 years o1d. The "adopted child"
category re-
quires that you have two years actual and legal custody of the child. On rare occasions,
the INS will grant an adopted child humanitarian parole, allowing the child to enter the
United States without a visa.
(By Alan Wernick)
 
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