A bi-national lesbian couple who live in San Jose in California was given a green card on July 15th after the Defence of Marriage Act was defeated by the Supreme Court. The DOMA Project says that Karin Bogliolo, who comes from the United Kingdom, is married to Judy Richard, who is a citizen of the United States.
The couple married in the January of last year and put in a green card application based upon that marriage, according to the DOMA Project. However, due to the fact that same-sex marriages were not recognized by the federal government at the time when the application was put in, the couple was forced to separate and Bogliolo had to go back to the United Kingdom.
With Richard having to spend six months of the year out of the US in order to be with her wife, due to the fact that the Bogliolo’s tourist US visa placed a limit on the amount of time she was able to stay in the country, the couple considered themselves to be “love exiles,” the article states.
The couple is the third same-sex pair to be given permanent residency thanks to their marriage with another bi-national same-sex couple having also been given a green card by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service. UK citizen Shaun Stent has been awarded a green card based on his same-sex marriage to US citizen John Catuara in the January of 2012, with the couple having been fighting to live together in the US for 13 years.