Immigrant widows have little support from the government

Any foreigner who marries a citizen of the United States is permitted to become a resident of the United States. But the US Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) have been trying to deport a large number of widows and a few widowers who had been married to citizens of US when the citizen died.

Bob Simon, a 60 Minutes correspondent, reported earlier that immigration has claimed that if the process of becoming a resident of the US has not been completed by a widow during the time her husband was alive, then she can be deported from the country.

A young nursing student from Brazil, Raquel Williams, was on her way to Florida when she and her three friends went to a gas station, when she first met her husband, Derek Williams. The two fell in love, married and finally had a child after two years of marriage.

But one day, Raquel woke up in the morning at 5:00 and found her husband lying on the sofa. She learnt that he wasn’t breathing, so she called 911 and by the time they arrived, he was gone.

Post her husband’s death, Raquel moved in with Derek’s parents with her son, Ian. Raquel finally had her immigration interview, something she had been wanting for a year in order prove the legitimacy of their marriage.

She explained everything during the interview, but they told her to go back to Brazil. When she claimed her son to be American citizen, they said he can stay but she has to leave. At that time, Ian was just five months old.

Like Raquel, a large number of widows, who entered the US legally, are now being deported. Their requests of permanent residency have consistently been rejected by the immigration department.

In Raquel’s case, had the interview happened while her husband was alive, she might have been US resident by now. As her mother-in-law pointed out that Raquel should not pay the price for the slow movement of the bureaucracy.