Canadian Citizen married US Citizen in US - what's the next step?

[StellaArtois]

Do you mind if I ask a few questions about your wedding and how you were able to do that? I’m a US citizen, my fiancé is Canadian. Our wedding is planned for next month and we are only now discovering they may stop him at the border as the wedding is in the US. He has no intention to stay, we will be living apart after the wedding as we file paperwork for me to immigrate into Canada. Did you simply state your intent at the border to get married? Was it a difficult process? What was that part of your experience like? Thank you!

I am a Canadian citizen who got married to my American citizen (now) husband in Michigan in June 2018. I went to Michigan to visit him (by plane since I was flying from Alberta) numerous times before that - once with him as my boyfriend, and 4 times with him as my fiance (with the final time being the time that we got married). At customs they always asked me some combination of the follow questions:
-where are you going?
-how long are you staying for?
-where do you work? what do you do at work? how did you manage to get this amount of time off from work to visit your husband? will you still be working there when you return?
-where does your significant other work? what does he do for work?
-can you show proof of a return ticket? (since I told them I was visiting my significant other)

Even when I went through customs to go to the US to get married, it was the same questions. They didn't ask if I was getting married so I didn't directly state it. However, like other users have said, it is 100% legal for a Canadian to marry a US citizen in the US. They just want to make sure that you leave if you don't have the appropriate paperwork to stay. So no, entering the US to get married to your US citizen husband should not be a problem provided that you have sufficient proof that you will definitely be leaving the country after your wedding.

Interestingly, I got consistently flagged to be pulled aside for additional questioning when crossing customs to visit my husband after getting married, but I never got flagged for additional questioning before getting married. They refused to directly tell me what exactly triggered the flag to pull me aside, though I have a good guess. After we were married, they always asked me what our plans were for moving to be together. They expected that I was trying to immigrate to the US, and each time I told them that we were in the process of completing paperwork for my husband to immigrate to Canada. After we submitted our application for my husband's permanent residence to CIC and received the AOR1 in July 2019, my subsequent customs crossing has not been flagged for further questioning, and they now let me through without pulling me aside for additional questioning.

Anyways all that to say, you will probably have no issues getting through customs to go get married. Just be prepared to provide proof that you are not staying in the US and have strong ties to Canada. If you go visit him in the US after being married before the immigration application has been filed and acknowledgement of receipt has been confirmed, you will likely be pulled aside for additional questioning, but you will probably still get through as long as you always have sufficient proof that you will be returning to Canada.

 

[AUG19]

You are worrying more than you need to about this situation. You are allowed to enter Canada to get married. In case CBSA asks questionsI would travel with proof of lease or home ownership, proof of job in the US and proof of return travel. As long as there is no reason, like past criminal convictions, your spouse won’t have issues at the border.

I got married in Halifax, I had a work letter saying that I had leave and my travel dates, he asked if I had an invitation and I showed him a photo on my phone, that was it, nothing else was asked.

 

[carrotsoup]

I was only asked where I was going and my expected date of return. Canuck is right! You are thinking too far into it.

I go back and forth across the border every two weeks and I get asked each time what the purpose of my visit was. I want to be prepared.

 

[AUG19]

BTW - I've been requesting a letter from my employer stating my approved holidays since I got engaged, sometimes they ask for proof, sometimes they don't, either way it's a good thing to have just in case. I also always have a hard copy of my return ticket (because once my phone died and I had no way of retrieving my ticket) and my travel insurance.