The newlywed game: Marriage and immigration

[Captain Ewok 1,889]

The newlywed game: Marriage and immigration

FOR MANY AMERICANS WHO MARRY FOREIGNERS, LOVE MUST FACE THE SCRUTINY OF THE U.S. CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION SERVICES

BY NIKKI WALLER

nwaller@MiamiHerald.com

My husband the French guy -- let's call him Fifi -- eats a grapefruit every morning. He stands hunched over the sink in his shorts, picking out the citrus flesh with a serrated spoon, the radio on in the background.

At night after work, Fifi nibbles pistachios at the kitchen counter, holding the shells in his cupped hand. When I come home, the reward for my long day is a pistachio-flavored kiss.

And once a week, Fifi delights in clipping his nails, a task he approaches with manic precision and endless pleasure, the tip of his tongue poking out in happy concentration as he snips at his fingers and toes.

I've memorized these details -- sweet, throwaway moments of any new marriage -- and countless others. When you marry a foreigner, you have to.

The road to wedded bliss runs through the immigration building on Biscayne and 79th, where newlyweds must appear before a government employee, making the case that their love is real. The reward for success: a temporary green card and the right to live and work in the U.S.

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Miami interviews about 1,800 couples a week, or about 93,000 a year. Of those, a ''large percentage'' are proved fraudulent, said USCIS Miami spokeswoman Ana Santiago.

At these hearings, recently married couples play a high-stakes version of the Newlywed Game, where a wrong answer can mean deportation, and, for the American, a $250,000 fine and up to five years in jail.

continued...

[rebeccajo 14]

Nice article.

[Elizabethnhenry 0]

Interested read! That will be me in a few weeks. Sigh.

[Kaalyx 0]

I'd like to read the six pages of questions her lawyer gave her to study. I might try to contact her for them. If she sends them, I'll post them!

[BelwinMills 0]

wow interesting info nice article

[Fandango 1,439]

I think it'd be fun to play the newlywed game there...who knows...if they witness a fight of ours, they'll be all 'yep they're legit, lol'

[JenT 0]

Thanks for posting this, Capt. I'm still crying as I type this... seems so far away for us....

Jen