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Last Updated: Apr 9, 2007 - 12:46:40 AM |
Even as the Senate and President Bush on Thursday were compromising on a proposal to restrict the number of foreigners allowed to remain in the USA, one point was overlooked: There are no limits on foreign spouses.
If you can marry a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident (a "green card" holder), you're guaranteed permanent access to the USA.
More foreigners gain U.S. residency through marriage than any other way, Department of Homeland Security data show. Marriage-based immigration accounted for 37% of all legal immigration in 2004, more than refugees and asylum seekers and employment-based immigrants combined.
Yet, Congress and the Bush administration have been so focused on border fences, guest-worker or amnesty programs that marriage-based immigration fraud has largely gone unnoticed. Immigration officials described fraud as rampant in a 2002 GAO report. Marriage fraud accounted for approximately half of all immigration fraud cases, the agency reported.
Marriage-based immigration has clear advantages:
A foreigner who marries a U.S. citizen can gain citizenship after two years rather than the usual five-year waiting period.
Cases of marriage fraud are rarely exposed. Homeland Security says it completed investigations of only 1% of marriage-based green cards in 2004.
A foreign-born spouse can apply for a green card after two years. Once approved, he or she can begin sponsoring other family members to come to the USA.
"Marrying a U.S. citizen is one of the easiest ways to stay in the United States once within the country's borders," said Janice Kephart, former counsel to the 9/11 Commission, in a 2005 report.
Kephart raises another caution about marriage fraud. After inspecting immigration files, she discovered numerous instances of immigration and marriage fraud by suspected foreign-born terrorists operating in the USA from the early 1990s to 2005.
Of the 36 suspected terrorists who obtained green cards or U.S. citizenship in the report, half acquired this status by marrying an American — 10 of them entering sham marriages. Kephart's report was for the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank based in Washington, D.C., that promotes tighter immigration controls.
The DHS needs to investigate more immigrant marriages, and Congress should consider lengthening the time required for foreign-born spouses to gain a green card and citizenship. If the love is real, a marriage surely will last a little longer.
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