With some amendments that I hope will be adopted when this bill is read for amendment. under the 5minute rule it will be the kind of bill the vast majority of the Members of this House can support. I want to raise one question. however. particularly in view of the emphasis that this bill very properly puts on the importance of reuniting families and the preference it gives to persons in that category. There is one category which I believe .is not reached by any of the changes in our immigration laws as proposed in this legislation. That is the foreign exchange student who comes here under a student visa under one of our exchange programs and then falls in love and marries an American citizen. Then a child is born. Then after the expiration of the student visa. he is told by our Government. "You have to go back to your homelandyou have to go abroad and live abroad for 2 years until you can return to join your spouse and child and so that you can acquire citizenship under the laws of this country." I have a case identical to the one I have just described in my office at the present time. and I am sure that many of my colleagues here on the floor of the House today could come up with similar situations. They know of the hardship that is involved in such cases. It disturbs me that there is no provision either in present law or in this bill that we are debating today which would provide that the Secretary of State should take into consideration facts such as I have just outlined and grant an exemption from the requirement of 2 years residence abroad before return on an immigrants visa. I would like to take this opportunity to ask the gentleman from West Virginia. the ranking minority member of the Immigration Subcommittee if he knows of any plans on the part of his subcommittee to deal with this particular problem.
Keywords matched
Immigration immigration immigrants visa