Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who wrote the judgment for the majority, noted, “We hold that a citizen does not have a fundamental liberty interest in her non-citizen spouse being admitted to the country.”
A US citizen, Sandra Munoz, had initiated the case to argue over her right to bring her husband, Luis Ascencio-Cordero from El Salvador, into the United States.
The State Department had denied Ascencio-Cordero a visa over suspicion of ties to the violent gang Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) because of his tattoos.
Although would-be migrants don’t have the right to challenge their visa denials, Ms. Munoz argued that the decision violated her marriage rights.
However, Justice Barrett stressed that the harm Munoz experienced as a result of her husband’s visa denial does not grant her a constitutional right to be involved in his immigration process.
But Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who dissented to the ruling, argued that the decision undermines the fundamental right to marriage recognized in the Supreme Court’s landmark Obergefell ruling on same-sex marriages. According to her, Munoz has a constitutionally protected interest in her husband’s visa application, as its denial infringes on her right to marriage.
In addition, she contended that this right extends to building a home, intimacy, and raising children together, making it warrant more than a cursory denial from the government.
According to analysts, Munoz’s case will influence thousands of similar cases in existence. The report added that last year, the State Department approved 11 million visas and denied 62,000 applications. The denied visas included those of 5,400 individuals seeking to join their U.S. citizen partners.
With the judgment, proponents of stricter immigration enforcement, who argue that U.S. citizens lack the right to contest a spouse’s deportation in court now have a point of unity with the Biden administration. These believe it would be illogical to create additional rights for someone outside the U.S. entirely.CONTINUE FULL READING>>>>>
