The Obama Administration has elected to split up a binational same-sex couple by deporting an Australian man, the legal husband of an HIV-positive U.S. citizen. Earlier this year, President Obama, Attorney General Holder, and the Department of Justice determined that DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act that bans the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages, was unconstitutional. This decision came after a federal judge had already found DOMA to be unconstitutional in two cases he decided. Additionally, we now have the ruling of a federal bankruptcy judge — signed by 20 federal judges of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California — finding DOMA unconstitutional.
READ:Â DOMA: NY Attorney General Challenges Gay Marriage Ban In Federal Court
Via The San Francisco Chronicle:
Bradford Wells, a U.S. citizen, and Anthony John Makk, a citizen of Australia, were married seven years ago in Massachusetts. They have lived together 19 years, mostly in an apartment in the Castro district. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services denied Makk’s application to be considered for permanent residency as a spouse of an American citizen, citing the 1996 law that denies all federal benefits to same-sex couples.
The decision was issued July 26. Immigration Equality, a gay-rights group that is working with the couple, received the notice Friday and made it public Monday. Makk was ordered to depart the United States by Aug. 25. Makk is the sole caregiver for Wells, who has severe health problems.
“I’m married just like any other married person in this country,” Wells said. “At this point, the government can come in and take my husband and deport him. It’s infuriating. It’s upsetting. I have no power, no right to keep my husband in this country. I love this country, I live here, I pay taxes and I have no right to share my home with the person I married.”
“We are appealing to the Obama administration to begin to put into action what they’ve said repeatedly they can do,” said Immigration Equality spokesman Steve Ralls. “The Department of Homeland Security and ICE have said again and again that they can exercise discretion in individual cases, but they have not done so for a single gay or lesbian couple yet.”
In rare cases, lawmakers can introduce so-called private bills to shield specific immigrants from deportation, but only after deportation proceedings have begun. Such bills are considered a last resort.
Drew Hammill, a spokesman for Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, said Pelosi has contacted immigration officials on behalf of the couple and “will be working to exhaust all appropriate immigration remedies that are open to pursue.”
To its credit, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), has intervened in other cases involving same-sex binational couples, and overturned the deportation order, sometimes temporarily, sometimes for an indeterminate amount of time, effectively, permanently.
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To be honest, while it is unfair to compare the needs of one couple with another, DHS and USCIS have the authority to examine each couple’s case individually, and make a determination on a case-by-case basis. How they can determine that this couple’s needs, and the needs of society are best-met by deporting the husband and de-facto full-time care-giver of an HIV-positive man with no other nearby family, is not only questionable, it is entirely unacceptable.
Please, sign this petition at Change.org, and this one at Immigration Equality.
Our extreme thanks to Dave Evans of SuchIsLifeVideos for this important clip.Â