I’m confused about who should be listed on the DS-260 when a person has had three marriages and children from different partners. The spouses seem clear: all three are listed; only the current spouse receives the dependent visa and status, and the ex-spouses are marked as not accompanying. It’s more complicated with the children — those adopted by the current spouse will accompany, biological children shared with the current spouse who are under 21 and unmarried will accompany, but children of partners from previous marriages who were not adopted will not? Am I correct in understanding that those children who weren’t included in the petition can later apply for citizenship through family reunification?
As far as I remember, on the DS-260 you list all children, even from a previous marriage - but only those who meet the immigration law’s definition of “child” are eligible to come. Partner’s children who haven’t been adopted really aren’t included - legally they’re not your children, so they don’t get included in the petition. Your own biological children from previous marriages are a different story; they can be petitioned separately later as immediate relatives.
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About family reunification — it’s important to make distinctions. If the child is biologically yours, you can petition as an “immediate relative” after getting a green card; you won’t have to wait in line. A partner’s children without adoption can’t be helped at all — there’s no legal relationship, family reunification won’t help. I heard from an acquaintance who thought it could be fixed later — she spent a year on consultations and in the end it didn’t work.
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In the first section of the form everything is written in detail — there’s a Russian translation there; I checked it when I filled it out. You list all children, even from previous marriages; that’s for listing — who actually travels is, by the immigration definition, a child. And there’s a separate DS-260 for each person, not one for the whole family. Regarding a partner’s children without adoption — you’re right, there’s no legal relationship and family reunification won’t fix that either. Hang in there )
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Everything is correct regarding the partner’s children — without adoption there is no legal relationship, neither now nor later through a petition. But regarding the DS-160: derivative beneficiaries can sometimes answer “yes” to the question about the immigrant petition; there’s a nuance in the wording — it’s worth checking with an attorney for the specific situation.
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Under the INA, a partner’s children who have not been adopted are not always automatically excluded — if the marriage was entered into before the child turned 18, the child qualifies as a stepchild and may be counted as a derivative. This is INA 101(b)(1)(B), and it is precisely because of this provision that the date of the marriage relative to the age of each particular child is critical. With three marriages and children from different partners, the family composition must be analyzed for each child separately — it’s quite possible that someone will qualify as a stepchild and be missed in an initial analysis.
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