Please let's end the deportations of same-sex spouses

For some gay couples, fight goes on to marry — and stay in the US: For binational gay couples, New York's same-sex marriage law doesn't help

While many gay couples in New York tie the knot on Sunday, when same-sex marriage becomes legal in the state, Ashley Abraham-Hughes and her wife, Corinne, will be watching the festivities from the other side of the Atlantic.

That’s because since U.S. federal law still does not recognize same-sex marriage, and since Corinne is British, the couple was forced to move to Britain, where their union — they wed in Connecticut in 2009 — is legal.

“While I do still love the U.S. and I always will, I am very resentful of the fact that I was effectively forced to become an expat,” said Abraham-Hughes, a 27-year-old who grew up in Pittsford in western New York and now lives in Manchester. “It’s absolutely ridiculous, and I just think the thinking on this whole issue is completely wrong.”

The couple’s plight is one likely facing many of the estimated 36,000 binational gay couples in the U.S., where the foreign partner in the relationship can face deportation and a 10-year ban from returning to America if they don’t already have or find a legal way to stay in the country.