According to court documents cited by Reuters on August 12, the US Department of Justice filed charges against 11 individuals on Wednesday. They are accused of being involved in a ten-year marriage fraud scheme, which involved arranging approximately 1,000 false marriages to help several foreign citizens obtain legal immigration status in the United States.
According to the indictment released by the Federal Court of Manhattan, foreign citizens paid up to $100,000 per person to a group of six ‘middlemen’ in order to arrange marriages with American citizens, thereby obtaining legal residency. The indictment also indicates that American citizens who agreed to participate in these marriages could receive a maximum compensation of $30,000.
Participants of this plan subsequently assisted "newlywed couples" in submitting documents to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to help foreign spouses obtain legal permanent residency in the United States.
Justice Secretary Todd Branche described this case as "one of the largest marriage fraud cases in American history," and pointed out that this fully demonstrates "that some people will go to any lengths to deceive the immigration system."
Previously, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that babies born in the United States have broad civil rights. Last week, President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at restricting ‘birth tourism’.
The United States Department of State stated on the same day that it has begun reviewing the activities of visa holders, focusing on targeting women who travel to the United States for the purpose of enabling their children to obtain American citizenship.
According to the New York Times, for many years, Trump has criticized birth citizenship and used it as a political tool in his efforts to restrict legal immigration. During his first presidential term, he talked about abolishing this right. He even appeared in oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court regarding cases involving birth citizenship, a precedent set by previous presidents.
Trump's top domestic policy advisor and the person who developed many of his immigration policies, Stephen Miller, along with White House Secretary Will Shaf, described these orders as a significant shift from the existing system.
