The United States government has announced that same-sex couples who are married may now put in an application for green card permits in the same manner as married heterosexual couples, in the latest attempt to put an end to discrimination against gay unions.
The move was announced on Monday by Janet Napolitano, the Director of Homeland Security. The decision stems from the landmark Supreme Court ruling made last week that extended federal rights and benefits to same-sex couples who have married in states that legally recognize the unions. Following the court ruling federal agencies were directed by President Barack Obama to make sure that it was smoothly implemented, according to Napolitano. “I have directed US Citizenship and Immigration Services to review immigration petitions filed on behalf of a same-sex spouse in the same manner as those filed on behalf of an opposite same-sex spouse,” Napolitano added.
A petition that was made by a gay couple that had wed in New York was immediately approved following the Supreme Court decision in a happy ending to what had been a race against time with the immigration court on the verge of deporting the non-US resident partner, an undocumented immigrant from Columbia.
The judge of the case acknowledged the case’s landmark nature in the wake of the now defunct Defense of Marriage Act, according to the co-founder of the DOMA Project, lawyer Lavi Soloway. Washington DC, along with 12 states, now allow gay marriage.