Entering US with British husband and dual citizen baby

Pretty sure I’ve asked this before in all these years, but now we’ve got a baby so asking again…

I’m USC, husband is UKC, and we have a dual citizen Infant.

I know that this can vary by airport, but which queue do we go in at US immigration? We usually enter through JFK or ATL.

Whenever I stop to ask in the immigration hall, I’m told to go in the queue that best fits the the non-citizen party. So, when we lived in the US with my husband on a green card it was always the permanent resident one, and since we’ve come back to the UK and he gave up the green card, we get told to go into the “all other countries” queue which takes AGES. And neither airport has a family queue like they do at the UK border, that I’m aware of.

I’d probably be better off ignoring the staff who aren’t immigration employees and playing dumb but all the years spent going through immigration processes in the US and the UK has me terrified of crossing them.

I’m travelling on a 9 hour flight with an infant for the first time and dreading standing in that queue for an hour when we land in ATL late at night and hoping someone here knows better.

SO, what do y’all do when entering the US?

So…..

Entered the USA in February 2020 and guy directing was INSISTENT we had to go through All Other Passports.  Took ages.  I was not impressed.

Entered USA last week, was directed to All Other Passports.  Was NOT moving.  Left the queue (just me) and politely asked a couple of staff directing.  They said we could use either but that All Other was MUCH shorter. I agreed that it was shorter but moving at a snails pace.  They then were like “ooo, that really isn’t moving”. Enter family experiment, me and one kid got in the US line.  Husband and other kid stood in other.  In the end, the USA line put us ahead of two families.  BUT had we been in the USA line from the start, we *would* have been faster. 

At the queue, the officer did NOT ask why we had used the USA line, so all was fine.

In the end, we had over 2 hours to make our connection and due to immigration queues we missed the connection.  First time flying connecting since 2013…. Unlikely to do that again EVER.   

To be fair, I don’t think we would have made the connection even in the USA line.

SO, what do y’all do when entering the US?

  For all the borders, We just get in whatever line is shortest, or whatever line the person running things forces us to.   Whether the officer will be happy with your choice is a coin toss.  I don't think there's any point in trying to prepare for this, just go with whatever makes sense at the time. 

Get in the citizen line if better off. I'm a UKC with a USC wife and two kids. When we went to LAX in May I was NOT getting in the non-citizen line with a 9 month old who had just travelled for over 14 hours, especially as she was a citizen and didn't need to be in that line (it was looooong). Once we got to the Border Officer he honestly didn't care. Usual check of passport, ESTA and fingerprints and on our way.

Get in the citizen line if better off. I'm a UKC with a USC wife and two kids. When we went to LAX in May I was NOT getting in the non-citizen line with a 9 month old who had just travelled for over 14 hours, especially as she was a citizen and didn't need to be in that line (it was looooong). Once we got to the Border Officer he honestly didn't care. Usual check of passport, ESTA and fingerprints and on our way.

Same experience as last week.  Border officer had zero issue with us being in the USC line.  I think the All Other line is taking MUCH longer at the moment as not everyone has used VeriFLY to upload their vaccination status, which is required for non-USC's.

Don't get me started on the hypocrisy of so few Americans being vaccinated but foreigners having to be vaccinated.

Okay this is all super helpful @KFdancer  @jimbocz  @Ben1989 !  I like your methods, and with a four month old I’m certainly willing to give it a go rather than ages in the long queue! Honestly in the past I get so het up sitting in that queue I don’t know what I’d do with a baby meltdown on top.

A stupid question though… when you go in the USC line, do you use the biometric machines or is there a non-machine one for USC/families (like there is at UK border)? I always used the machines pre-baby but am assuming our 4 month old can’t do so, similar to the E-gates here?

My most recent trip only had the machines available for people who pay for global entry.  Everyone else (us) had to go through regular desks and have photos there.

In the past, we’ve had the machines and EVERYONE uses it, whether USC or not. Baby is fun. You can adjust the camera up and down and they may have you hold baby up so you aren’t in the photo. They are funny photos! 

@KFdancer love it!  Okay, going to give this a go!! I’ll report back… 

I said I’d report back, so just to say we went through the USC line and all was fine, and super quick. This was at ATL where they don’t have the machines, so I don’t know how it’d work at JFK where they do. But it was a great result nonetheless. To think all these years I was just casually obeying the stewards and spending ages in the all other passports queue!