Green Cards for Same-Sex Couples? Forgetaboutit. nt

[NorthCarolina]

U.S. immigration service will no longer accept green card applications from bi-national same sex couples

A victory scored by married bi-national same sex couples this week turned out to be only temporary.

After only one day, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) said it would no longer accept green card applications from gays and lesbians with spouses from abroad.

"The guidance we were awaiting... was received last night, so the hold is over, so we're back to adjudicating cases as we always have," Christopher Bentley, a USCIS spokesman, told Metro Weekly.

The Obama administration announced last month that it would no longer defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in court.

The administration said, however, that the law would continue to be enforced until Congress decided to repeal or modify it.

When asked if USCIS would also continue to deny green card applications to bi-national same sex couples, Bentley said, "Correct, based on the enforcement of DOMA."

Link: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/30/u-s-immigration-service-will-no-longer-accept-green-card-applications-from-bi-national-same-sex-couples/

[Jazz Ambassador]

1. I bow to no one in my utter contempt for DOMA, but:

1) U.S. immigration law, separate from DOMA, is clear on the point that it will only recognize a prospective immigrant's claim to family status based on U.S. law, not the law of the prospective immigrant's origin. To use the most obvious and common example -- far more common that same-sex marriage -- an U.S. citizen or green card holder from a country in which polygamous marriage is legal cannot petition more than one wife.

2) The executive branch unilaterally deciding which laws should be enforced -- and thus effectively unilaterally deciding what the law is -- is one of the many things we should be eager to leave behind now that we've consigned the Bush Administration to the ash-heap of history.