Teaching Marriage Fraud
Marriage fraud is a really rich topic for class conversation. Here’s how I approach the subject.
I start off by acknowledging the very real benefits of marrying a USC. We look at the DHS Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, Table 6. And we talk about the numbers of quota-exempt spouses. We consider these stats in light of the current visa bulletin and discuss how long an individual might otherwise have to wait for an immigrant visa or whether they would even fit within an allowable category.
We then discuss the Immigration Marriage Fraud Amendments (IMFA) and the concept of “conditional residency.” We spend time talking about the limitations of the IMFA. Problems 5 and 6 in Chapter 3 of Legomsky & Thronson (p. 367 of the 7th edition) do a great job of sussing out some limitations of the statute. And that textbook’s discussion of the faulty statistics that sparked the creation of the IMFA is truly illuminating.
At the same time, marriage fraud is real–even if we doubt the numbers the led to the IMFA’s enactment. So, how can we accurately tell that story?
I like to throw actress Nicole Byer under the bus. As I wrote about three years ago, Nicole (of Nailed It! fame) went on Conan and publicly admitted to marriage fraud. I play that interview in its entirety, which isn’t very long. And we talk about the consequences she faced in telling this story (none) and the consequences for her former husband (denaturalization).
Another great resource is this June 2019 story about a marriage fraud ring in Houston. Why is that story so juicy? Well, for one, it involves a large number of people–as much as 150 migrants paying $70,000 each for marriage. But, more to the teaching point, how was this scheme found out? Was it the IMFA? No! As the Houston Chronicle explains:
[F]ederal agents noticed a pattern. Immigration petitions from Houston were arriving in the same type of envelope with a nearly identical cover letter filled out in a similar cursive script. Every one of 30 petitions had been mailed from the same Houston post office[.]
Aha!
If you have other ideas for teaching marriage fraud, let me know. I’d love to hear them.
-KitJ