Immigration Corner | USCIS wants my husband to prove his first marriage was real

Dear Mrs Walker-Huntington,

Thanks for your weekly column in The Gleaner. It’s always very informative.

My husband, a green card holder, petitioned for me to join him in America, but it was denied and he’s being asked to prove that his previous marriage was bona fide.

What is his best course of action going forward?

Worried wife.

Dear Worried Wife,

This situation is a concern but not insurmountable. When someone is filed for by their spouse to migrate to America, they must prove that the marriage is a real marriage under the immigration rules – that it is a bona fide marriage.

Immigration presumes all immigration-based marriages are fake and places the burden on the couple to prove that the marriage was not entered into solely for immigration benefits. This requires the couple to provide evidence of the relationship – cohabitation where applicable, comingling of assets and debts, contact, if in different countries, financial support, and an ongoing relationship. It also requires further evidence in the form of photographs and affidavits of friends and/or relatives who will vouch for the validity of the couple’s relationship.

Approximately half of all marriages in America end in divorce. However, if the immigrant who received his/her residency through marriage divorces, remarries and files for a new spouse within five years of receiving their residency, it raises a red flag. This might be what happened in your husband’s situation. Or maybe, immigration has other reasons to suspect that your husband’s first marriage was dubious.

In any event, this situation can be overcome but your husband must prove that his first marriage was real and not entered into solely for immigration purposes. He needs to find his ex-wife, if possible, and gather documents and affidavits to demonstrate that he entered into the first marriage with good intentions, that it was bonafide and that the marriage fell apart for whatever reason. It is important for your husband to pursue and resolve this issue because it could come back to haunt him, and US Citizenship and Immigration Services could move to revoke his green card.

Dahlia A. Walker-Huntington, Esq. is a Jamaican-American attorney who practises immigration law in the United States; and family, criminal and international law in Florida. She is a mediator and former special magistrate and hearing officer in Broward County, Florida. info@walkerhuntington.com