Same Sex Immigration

June 26, 2014

USCIS Has Limited Medical Examination Report Validity Period to One Year

USCIS recently announced new policy changes regarding Form I-693, Report of Medical Examination and Vaccination Record. Starting June 1, 2014, USCIS has limited the validity period for all Forms I-693 to one year from the date that USCIS receives the form. This updated policy applies to any Form I-693 supporting a benefit application that USCIS adjudicates on or after June 1, 2014.

If you are applying for adjustment of status, you may submit Form I-693 in one of the following ways:

Submit Form I-693 by mail, together with your Form I-485, Application to Register for Permanent Residence or Adjust Status, to the location specified for your Form I-485 (see “Direct Filing Addresses for Form I-485”).

July 18, 2013

Green Card Lottery Diversity Visa 2013 Winners: Same Sex Marriage Green Cards and DOMA Impact

by Jacob Sapochnick

This is a very important update from AILA. The deadline for submitting an

Application to Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status (I- 485) for winners of the 2013 Diversity Visa (DV) lottery is fast approaching; an adjustment of status application must be approved or immigrant vis a issued by September 30, 2013.

With the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in U.S. v. Windsor,570 U.S. 3196928 (2013), married same – sex couples are no longer barred from receiving federal

June 29, 2013

DOMA is DEAD: What Same Sex Couples Need to know about Immigration Options?

by Jacob Sapochnick

I am still at the American Immigration Lawyers Association Annual Conference in San Francisco. We just finished a panel about LGBT Same Sex Immigration Issues. The confusion is whether Gay Couples can now file for Immigration benefits and how will that work. The representative from Marriage Equality was very helpful and pointed us to their site, see below an initial FAQ From Marriage Equality:

What did the Supreme Court say about DOMA?

The U.S. Supreme Court held that Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (“DOMA”) is unconstitutional. Section 3 of DOMA was a federal law that limited federal marriage recognition to different-sex couples. Because immigration law is federal, DOMA prevented lawfully married lesbian and gay couples from obtaining lawful permanent residence (“green cards”) through marriage. Now that DOMA has been struck down, American citizens and lawful permanent residents can submit green card applications for their same-sex spouse.

June 26, 2013

DOMA Ruled Unconstitutional! Questions Raised for Same Sex Couples Moving Forward

by Jacob Sapochnick

Today, the United States Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), describing the federal law as an assault on fundamental human rights. In his opinion, Justice Kennedy said the law served “no legitimate purpose” to justify the effect of the law, and was a way to “disparage and to injure those whom the state, by its marriage laws, sought to protect in personhood and dignity.”

In concluding the decision, the Supreme Court concluded that “DOMA’s principal effect is to identify and make unequal a subset of state-sanctioned marriages. It contrives to deprive some couples married under the laws of their State, but not others, of both rights and responsibilities, creating two contradictory marriage regimeswithin the same State. It also forces same-sex couples to live as married for the purpose of state law but unmarried for the purpose of federal law, thus diminishing the stability and predictability of basic personal relations the State has found it proper to acknowledge and protect.”

In response to this decision, President Obama stated in a statement released by the White House the federal law “treated loving, committed gay and lesbian couples as a separate and lesser class of people,” He said the Supreme Court has “righted that wrong, and our country is better off for it.”

March 21, 2012

Same-Sex Immigration Rules: No Signs for Reform; Couples in a Bind

by Jacob Sapochnick

Tens of thousands of same-sex couples in the United States live under the threat of separation because federal law prohibits immigration authorities from treating them the same as married opposite-sex couples.

And in a country where feelings run deep on immigration and same-sex marriage, the foreign-born same-sex spouses and partners of Americans live in a unique legal limbo: In the eyes of the government, they’re neither married nor are they citizens.

It’s an emotional and financial burden. They can’t leave the country to see loved ones for fear they won’t be allowed back. They might not be allowed to work or get loans to pay for college. If they’re deported, they can be barred from re-entering the U.S.