Mexico Adoption Program

• Non-medical special needs children are age 9+.
• Children of all ages with various special needs are available.
• Sibling groups are available.

• The age difference between adoptive parents and a child should be at least 18 but not be more than 45 years.
• Parents must be over age 25.
• Single women are accepted into the program.
• A couple has to be married for at least 2 years.

1. Apply to Nightlight
2. Complete your orientation process and start the home study
3. When the home study is complete, send your I-800a (pre-visa) form to USCIS (we'll give you instructions)
4. When your I-800a has been approved, you'll send a dossier with various documents in it to Mexico
5. The dossier will be officially translated and then submitted to the National DIF office for their approval
6. Once approved, your dossier will be sent to the State DIF office you'll be working with. If you are adopting a relative, it will be sent to the State DIF office in the state where the child lives. If you are asking to adopt a waiting child, we will direct your dossier to a Mexican state that will hopefully be able to refer you a child within 6-12 months. You will travel to Mexico and spend a week to two weeks of supervised time with the child you hope to adopt, whether you are related to the child or not.
7. When the referral comes, you'll complete an official referral review with Nightlight's Social Services Department.
8. Then you'll file form I-800 with USCIS (we'll give you the instructions).
9. Based on the approval of the I-800 form, we will file a form DS-260 on your behalf with the US Consulate in Ciudad Juarez, who will then issue a document called an Article 5 letter, which is sent to the National DIF office in Mexico City and then to the State DIF office where your child is located.
10. Once the Article 5 letter has been issued, if you are not a Mexican/US dual citizen or a Mexican citizen, you'll get a Mexican adoption visa from your nearest Mexican Consulate and you'll get a Mexican Migratory Card for Purposes of Adoption in Mexico. We'll explain how to do that.
11. At that point, your case can be prepared and presented to court to request the final decree of adoption.
12. The court will set a date for a hearing at which you'll need to be present in Mexico.
13. After the final decree is issued (which may be some time after the hearing), you will return to Mexico to request the child's corrected birth certificate (now with your surnames), and then you'll return home again to wait for events to be scheduled for your final trip to Mexico.
14. The final trip generally takes about a week to 10 days: You'll pick up the child, go to Mexico City to apply for their passport and pick up a document at the Secretary of Foreign Relations (Article 23), then fly to Ciudad Juarez for the child's appointment at the US Consulate-approved Medical Clinic, and then make 2-3 trips to the US Consulate to complete the process.
15. At that point, you can bring your child across the border into El Paso and send us a photo of your triumphant arrival!
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Referrals are provided by National System for Family Development (DIF) of the Mexican state the child resides in. The referral will contain basic information on child’s medical and social background and pictures. Referral time depends on the profiles of the child(ren) a family looks to adopt. Four to five trips to Mexico are likely required, though each Mexican state may have different requirements. The length of the trips may range from 3 days to 3 weeks in length

Within 30 days of your arrival home, you must have a home visit by your home study provider. Your home study provider will then prepare post-adoption reports and submit them to Nightlight every 6 months after homecoming for the first three years. These reports include your child’s developmental progress and pictures. This is a very serious commitment. Compliance with post adoption reports is also required by The Hague Convention. Therefore, Nightlight charges a fee to monitor and process these post placement reports and also requires families to pay for the cost of the post placement report in advance.