In the Matter of Lawidjaja

Amicus brief urging immigration officials to stop denying immigration protection to same-sex couples based on the so-called Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

Summary

Lambda Legal filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), supporting Samuel Wu and Rudy Lawidjaja, a married binational gay couple from Montgomery County, Maryland. Lawidjaja, an Indonesian immigrant, met Wu, a U.S. citizen, in 2001, and the two have been in a committed relationship for over 10 years, marrying in Connecticut in September 2009. As the spouse of a U.S. citizen, Lawidjaja should be legally entitled to immigration protection under the Immigration and Nationality Act. However, immigration officials denied Lawidjaja’s right application forto immigration protection, citing the so-called Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which bans federal recognition of marriages between same-sex spouses. In the brief, Lambda Legal urges the BIA to close or postpone pending immigration cases involving same-sex couples until legal challenges over DOMA’s constitutionality are settled.