Should I get divorce before I can marry again in the US? I am in the US with F-2 visa. My husband and I are not US citizens or Green Card holders. We are here with F-1 and F-2 visas and our marriage happened in our home country. Now I want to marry with a US citizen. What is the procedure I must do? Is it necessary to go to my home embassy in the US and request a divorce there. Then after it accepted and happened, take this paper to a US court to get permission to marry again? Can we do our divorce in the US without going to our home country embassy and no need to get any paper from them? *** Should I leave the US after getting divorce and apply for a new marriage visa from outside of the US or I can do it inside the US immediately after getting divorce with no need to leave the country?
It is illegal to marry while you are already married This is the crime of bigamy in all 50 states. A marriage ends with the death of one of the couple, a divorce or (in some very limited circumstances) an annulment. The US will recognise any of these wherever they happen so it’s your choice whether you get divorced in your home country or the US. By the way, don’t cause the death of your husband, that’s also illegal.
If the spouse of the US president filed for divorce, would a) the President have any claim of immunity from any litigation that followed (e.g. the division of assets in the matrimonial pot, child custody etc.), The President could claim it, but the President wouldn't win. Notably, a number of state governors and mayors have divorced while in office, and other foreign heads of state have been divorced while in office. For example, a U.K. court recently handled the divorce of a UAE monarch (over his objections to jurisdiction on sovereign immunity grounds), applying the same common law principles of head of state and sovereign immunities that exist in U.S. law and concluded that it had the authority to move forward with the case. Also, any Presidential divorce would take place in state court, not in federal court. Federal courts do not have subject-matter jurisdiction over divorce and custody cases (under the &quot;domestic relations exception&quot; to federal jurisdiction), so the civil action could not be removed to federal court, unlike federal criminal cases involving the official duties of the President and unlike civil cases over which the federal courts have jurisdiction. b) would all the proceedings be fully held in private, This would be in the reasonable discretion of the judge. It would not be a matter of right, but it is quite plausible that a judge might close the proceedings, especially if minor children were involved. c) could the President themselves be compelled to take the stand and Yes. A party to a lawsuit may always be compelled to take the stand, at least if no other person can provide a full substitute for the party's testimony. In ordinary civil lawsuits against the President, a President is usually compelled to testify only if an underling involved in the same matter cannot provide equivalent testimony. In many civil cases naming the President in his official capacity, the President has no personal knowledge of the facts and so can't be compelled to testify. But that would rarely be true in a divorce case, and would never be true in a divorce case where custody was an issue. This said, a state divorce court judge would almost certainly be very deferential to the scheduling concerns of the President for that testimony, and might allow that testimony to be provided remotely via videoconference so as to minimize the interruption this would pose to affairs of state and to address the security concerns of the Secret Service (i.e. the President's official bodyguards). d) what would happen if the President refused to do so? The judge could hold the President in contempt of court, which is punishable by fines and/or incarceration. But a more likely outcome, tailored to minimize interference with government business, is that the Court would sanction a President who defied an order to testify by assuming as a matter of law that any testimony from the President would have been unfavorable to the President and make a conclusive adverse inference on the evidentiary issues about which the President was asked to testify against the President.
There's no hard deadline for you to return to the US. There are some consequences, however, beginning at 180 days, at which point you are to be processed at the border as an &quot;applicant for admission,&quot; which will usually have little practical impact on the process. After a year, your green card is no longer valid for admission to the US. This doesn't mean that you lose your LPR status, and the green card remains valid for other purposes. It just means that you should get a returning resident visa (unless you have a re-entry permit, which you would have to have acquired before leaving the US, so I assume you don't have one). There are ways to get into the US without a returning resident visa -- in particular, an airline isn't going to refuse to fly you to the US, because they won't know that you've been away for more than a year. Your LPR status remains until there is a formal finding that you have abandoned your residence in the US. This can be a result of your voluntarily relinquishing it or of an administrative or judicial action. In general, it's probably safe to say, the longer you're away, the more likely the immigration officer is to look into the possibility of abandonment. If you are absent for more than six months, you may also delay your eligibility to naturalize because this absence would disrupt &quot;continuity of residence.&quot; A good starting point is the USCIS page International Travel as a Permanent Resident, which has more information about these matters as well as links to more detailed descriptions of some of them. Since this is https://law.stackexchange.com/, I suppose I should add some citations. The 180-day threshold is found in 8 USC 1101(a)(13)(c). The one-year threshold is at 8 CFR 211.1(a)(2). Residence requirements for naturalization are regulated at 8 CFR 316.5. It should be stressed that failing to meet these requirements does not by itself put your LPR status at risk; it only affects your ability to qualify for naturalization.
There are several reasons people wish to get a marriage annulled. I'll try to list them in order of frequency -- though I'm unaware of any statistics that confirm that my ordering is correct. Money. As per Nij's comment, when people are divorced, their property is subdivided 50-50. If one person can get away with an annulment, and keep the property which he earned, then it will be in his interests to do so. Religious reasons. As per SJuan76's comments, several churches, including Catholic, Mormon, and Russian Baptist, do not allow a person to marry if his previous spouse is still alive. An annulment is a way around that. Fraud marriages. This is rare, but under Trump it happens more often then you might think. People (usually women) come to the US illegally, marry someone (generally significantly older), and after the wedding day they are never again seen by their spouse. They use their marriage certificate to ensure permission to stay in the US -- but, they were never interested in marrying that person in the first place. When found, often such people are living with another illegal alien "as a boyfriend", with kids born before the fraud marriage even took place. It is in such cases, that their new spouse often tries to attain an annulment of the marriage -- to make sure that the illegal alien doesn't get rewarded for cheating them. Personal reasons. For some people, having never been married means it's easier to get a spouse who also has never been married -- and being able to check the "Single -- Never married" box on a form is always a plus in such cases. Now, don't ask me why people prefer to marry someone who's never been married, over someone who's been divorced. :) Incest. Under the US law, if you marry someone who's your close relative, then you are guilty of a felony -- even if you didn't know they're your close relative at the time of marriage. However, if you annul the marriage, then you can avoid prosecution.
What could be the consequences of this wedding? They would be married For example, if they break up and end their PACS in France, would they still be officially married in the USA? Yes, and also in France. And if after that they marry other partners, could this be a problem for them when applying for an American visa? Yes, bigamy is illegal in both the USA and France. Does France and the USA exchange information on wedding of foreign citizens on their soil? Don't know, probably not. Could they even end up being officially married in France even without doing any paperwork themselves? Most definitely. France recognises US marriages so they would be married in France (and the U.K., and Australia, and Germany, and ...). This is true even if the French government doesn't know they are married.
We do not have a law requiring you to renounce citizenships that you might hold, like the Nationality Law. I am not sure what you mean saying that renouncement is processed only within the Japanese legal system -- that is how it is everywhere, and there is no international authority or clearing house that handles citizenship renunciations. The effect of renouncing Japanese citizenship would be that you are then no longer a citizen of Japan: I can't find an explicit law prohibiting an exclusively-Japanese citizen from renouncing his citizenship and becoming stateless. A dual citizen would then be exclusively a citizen if "the other country", thus you would become strictly an Iranian citizen. According to the Civil Code of Iran you would be an Iranian citizen under clause 2 of Article 976. Article 977 allows accept a different citizenship but that would not apply if you have an Iranian father (and I guess does not actually get rid of your Iranian citizenship). Article 988 sets conditions for Iranians to abandon their nationality: you must be 25 or older, have renounced all property rights in Iran by transfer to Iranian nationals, have done your military service, and, have approval of the Council of Ministers. So yeah, not possible. Article 14 of the Japanese Nationality Law requires you to "choose either of the nationalities" before reaching 22, and furthermore Choice of Japanese nationality shall be made either by depriving himself or herself of the foreign nationality or by the declaration provided for in the Family Registration Law in which he or she swears that he or she chooses to be a Japanese national and that he or she renounces the foreign nationality (hereinafter referred to as “declaration of choice ”) Article 16 says "A Japanese national who has made the declaration of choice shall endeavour to deprive himself or herself of the foreign nationality". The bold part above seems to resolve that paradox, although that is based on a US-style interpretation of law and working from a translation of the law. That is, the requirement is that you try, not that you succeed (which is impossible in the case of a person with an Iranian father). There would be an effect in the US. If you renounce Japanese citizenship, you're strictly an Iranian national, and that has one consequence. What is not clear is whether the US recognizes, in any way, a renunciation which Iran doesn't recognize. This case features a person with renounced Iranian citizenship (he is also a US citizen), who was approved for a security clearance based in part on his renounciation. This gives some indication that the US does not care that Iran makes renunciation next to impossible. This is of course just for informational purposes and calls for an immigration attorney if it really matters.
One can find contradictory claims out there. Here is an English version of the marriage law. There is a surprising amount of legal rigamarole (in Norway, as well) pertaining to clearing "impediments". Assuming that the parties have done their part, then we move to Chapter 4. Article 16: Marriage may take place before a minister of the church, a representative of a registered religious organization empowered to perform such ceremonies, cf. Article 17, or before a civil official so empowered So turning to Article 17: Religious solemnization of marriage shall be performed by the ministers of the National Church, and priests or other representatives of registered religious organizations in Iceland who have been empowered to perform such ceremonies by the Ministry of Justice and Ecclesiastical Affairs and that is now part of the Ministry of the Interior. I can't find any indication that ULC has been approved. There are 49 religions officially listed by Statistics Iceland, including Siðmennt, a secular humanist organization which gained official status on May 3rd, 2013 when the organization was officially registered as a secular life stance organization under a law passed in the Icelandic Parliament on January 30th of that year. A formal ceremony was held by the Interior Minister Ögmundur Jónasson who had strongly supported our cause, to mark this historical event. As a result, Siðmennt gained the same legal and funding status as religious life stance organizations in Iceland. Weddings conducted by Siðmennt celebrants since then are legal and couples no longer have to go to government offices for that purpose. In light of the fact that Siðmennt is officially listed and ULC is not listed, I would conclude that you did not accidentally marry anyone, even if they had dealt with the impediments.
When you get married is possible to have contract renouncing both parties right to a divorce. No. That clause would be redundant, materially indistinguishable from breach of contract, and otherwise unenforceable. It is redundant because the legal definition of Marriage (Black's Law Dictionary) states that it is "A contract, according to the form prescribed by law, by which a man and woman [...] mutually engage with each other to live their whole lives together in the state of union which ought to exist between a husband and a wife". Thus, the perpetuity as expressed in the term whole lives preempts the conceiving of an eventual separation. Insofar as marriage is legally cognizable as a contract (see legal definition), it might specify or imply remedies in the event that one or both spouses decide(s) that substance of marital relationship no longer exists; that is, in the event that a breach of that contract occurs. A court may order to the breaching spouse performance of certain acts (for example, alimony) in accordance to statutory law or common law. However, a prohibition to divorce goes beyond the scope of what is legally permissible. The U.S. Supreme Court in Roberts v. United States Jaycees, 468 U.S. 609, 617-618 (1984) helps explaining why a prohibition to divorce would be unenforceable: "In one line of decisions, the Court has concluded that choices to enter into and maintain certain intimate human relationships must be secured against undue intrusion by the State because of the role of such relationships in safeguarding the individual freedom that is central to our constitutional scheme. In this respect, freedom of association receives protection as a fundamental element of personal liberty." If that is not possible how much can you limit the right to a divorce with a contract or something similar? There is no possible limit or requisite duration of a marriage, as that would inherently infringe a person's fundamental element of personal liberty mentioned in the Roberts case.