Banning child marriage in the U.S.: making progress or falling short?
In March 2016, the U.S. launched its Global Strategy to Empower Adolescent Girls. The strategy referred to forced child marriage as a “human rights abuse” that “produces devastating repercussions for a girl’s life.” Yet, the U.S. still has no national law banning child marriage. So far, only 13 states have outlawed child marriage without exception, which means that marriage under the age of 18 is still legal in 37 states. Now, Sen. Dick Durbin has introduced a new bill that threatens to roll back child marriage protections in over half the states by allowing minors from around the world to obtain spousal visas to the U.S.
Prevention or contradiction?
The federal bill, called the Child Marriage Prevention Act is intended to fight child marriage. Given that the U.S. has committed, along with the rest of the world, to ending child marriage by 2030, you might expect the minimum age for obtaining a spousal visa would be 18—but that’s not the case. The minimum age stated is a startling 16. And, the states that refuse to ban child marriage would be financially rewarded.
Fraidy Reiss, Founder of Unchained At Last in an article by Ms. Magazine, said:
“This (the bill) would legalize and encourage predators to “save” teens in other countries by marrying them and bringing them to the U.S.”
The teens that would suffer the most are girls. Between 2007 and 2017, U.S. Customs and Immigration Services approved visa petitions where girls were the younger party in 95% of the cases. Although the bill claims to restrict the underage spousal visas to “humanitarian” situations “arising from a risk of individualized and targeted harm,” this is hardly a reason to approve it. Reiss noted that most girls trafficked to the U.S. already find themselves in dangerous situations to obtain a spousal visa. Therefore, this bill would barely change the current law, which has no minimum age for spousal or fiancée visas. Even with the bill, it would still be legal for 16- or 17-year-old girls from other countries to marry U.S. adults.
Reiss continued:
“Besides, why end child marriage for everyone except girls in “humanitarian” circumstances? Do American girls deserve the protection of an “18 no exceptions” marriage age, while girls in humanitarian settings should be happy with 16? Are we to believe that a human rights abuse can be humanitarian?”