Following up on news that's been developing all week, MetroWeekly reports that the hold placed on denial of green cards to foreigners who are part of same-sex married bi-national couples is now over:
The "hold" on same-sex married bi-national couples' green card applications — celebrated by immigration and LGBT advocates — is over, according to the spokesman for the agency that processes those requests.
"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," U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services press secretary Christopher Bentley told Metro Weekly this morning.
The agency will continue to "enforce the law," he says, which means that the Defense of Marriage Act — which prohibits the government from recognizing same-sex marriages — prevents those green card applications from being approved.
Hopes were raised last Friday, when an article in The Daily Beast reported that two United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) District Offices had both confirmed that that alien relative petitions and green card applications filed by married same-sex couples would not be denied, based on legal questions surrounding the Defense of Marriage Act.
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services agency confirmed that to be true, but dashed hopes by warning that enforcement of cases against same-sex couples could resume within weeks.
That hold now has apparently ended.
