Outland Sponsorship of Spouse Confusion

[stephano]

My spouse has no status in Canada so we were set to file for outland sponsorship. She does not have a U.S. passport as it was not required at the time she came into Canada. Does anyone know if she can apply for a passport while living in Canada? I've scoured the internet but cannot come up with an answer to this question. Also would like to know if the fbi check needs to be done before we apply? I have read various things stating the fbi clearance takes ages. Any help you could give me would be appreciated

[scylla]

Because she has never held a US passport, she must apply in person. (If she had an expired passport, she would be able to apply for a new passport by mail from Canada easily.) Instructions for applying in person are here:

http://travel.state.gov/passport/get/first/first_830.html

To the best of my knowledge, all of the locations/facilities that allow you to apply in person are located in the US (see above link for details). In other words, she must physically go to the US to apply for a passport since she has never had a passport before. Hopefully someone else can confirm or correct this information.

[scylla]

I think I may have spoken too soon... It looks like you may be able to apply from outside of the US based on this page:

http://travel.state.gov/passport/get/outside/outside_5462.html

You'll need to contact your local embassy or consulate directly to confirm and to find out how the process works (seems like it's different for every embassy and consulate).

[stephano]

Thank you scylla for finding that link! That's probably the best news we've had since we started trying to work on this. This all has been more than daunting and we've not even really begun yet  I seem to be confused by just about everything in the application forms