Spouses always get better treatment as there is a voter who would be mad otherwise. They check for scam marriages but otherwise hurry the process through - if they don't a voter contacts their congressman to push the process. That voter will also likely know a lot of other voters and thus influence the next election while someone not married is unlikely to have that local network to use.
Yes, I am aware, which is why my grandparent comment said “[…] once someone […] has met the residency requirement to apply for citizenship.”
The amount of time one has to wait before meeting the residency requirement (aka before they can apply for the US citizenship) depends on other circumstances. With the default being 5 years (technically 4 years and 9 months, because by the time process finishes and you get your citizenship, you will hit the required 5y mark, so they officially let people apply at 4y9mo mark; there is even a first-party "early filing calculator" tool[0]), and the number going down depending on whether it was through marriage, whether you served in the US military and applied for the expedited process, etc.
However, my post explicitly mentioned that I was talking about the time one has to wait after they apply for the US citizenship, to which this has zero relevance.
0. https://www.uscis.gov/archive/uscis-early-filing-calculator
I would love to see data that backs this up. While definitely plausible the pathway she followed to naturalization was based on time in country and not our marriage. I didn’t need to push but I’ve generally found my congressman (who is also almost our neighbor) to be pretty unresponsive on any other issue.
My understanding - which may not be correct - is the length of the process primarily depends on your country of origin and secondarily on how you are eligible. Very interested in any source showing that a relatively normal process has pushed out from months to years.
This is patently false for one reason - once someone has a U.S. green card and has met the residency requirement to apply for citizenship, the application form and process are the same for everyone, regardless of how they got their green card (through work, marriage, asylum, investment, etc.).
Once you are eligible to apply, the whole process is basically form N400->biometrics->interview (just doublechecking your name and other paper info, takes 5 minutes)->civics test->ceremony.
However, the timelines and process for getting the green card itself is different depending on the nature of your visa, and they will indeed try to check for scam marriages before you get your green card (if you were applying for it through the marriage visa).