American government approved thousands of child bride requests
Pakistan among countries from where most such requests were made; people die to come to US, says Naila
WASHINGTON: Thousands of requests by men to bring in child and adolescent brides to live in the United States were approved over the past decade, according to government dataobtainedbytheassociatedpress.
In one case, a 49-year-old man applied for admission for a 15-year-old girl.
The approvals are legal: The Immigration and Nationality Act does not set minimum age requirements. And in weighing petitions for spouses or iancees, US Citizenship and Immigration Services goes by whether the marriage is legal in the home country and then whether the marriage would be legal in the state where the petitioner lives.
But the data raises questions about whether the immigration system may be enabling forced marriage and about how US laws may be compounding the problem despite efforts to limit child and forced marriage. Marriage between adults and minors is not uncommon in the United States, and most states allow children to marry with some restrictions.
There were more than 5,000 cases of adults petitioning on behalf of minors and nearly 3,000 examples of minors seek- ing to bring in older spouses or iances, according to the data requested by the Senate Homeland Security Committee in 2017 and compiled into a report.
Some victims of forced marriage say the lure of a US passport combined with lax US marriage laws are partly fuelling the petitions.
“My passport ruined my life,” said Naila Amin, a dual citizen from Pakistan who grew up in New York City.
She was forcibly married at 13 in Pakistan and applied for papers for her 26-year-oldhusbandtocometothecountry.
“People die to come to America,” she said. “I was a passport to him. They all wanted him here, and that was the way to do it.”
Naila Amin, now 29, said she was betrothed to her irst cousin Tariq when she was just 8 and he was 21. The petition was eventually terminated after she ran away. She said the ordeal cost her a childhood. She was in and out of foster care and group homes, and it took a while to get her life on track.
“I was a child. I want to know: Why weren’t any red lags raised? Whoever was processing this application, they don’t look at it? They don’t think?” Amin asked.
The country where most requests came from was Mexico, followed by Pakistan, Jordan, the Dominican Republic and Yemen. Middle Eastern nationals had the highest percentage of overall approved petitions.
Thereisatwo-stepprocessforobtaining US immigration visas and green cards. Petitions are irst considered by USCIS. If granted, they must be approved by the State Department. Overall, there were 3.5 million petitions received from budget years 2007 through 2017.