Immigrants marry fast to protect themselves from Trump
Couples with a foreign-born partner are marrying as the safest and most affordable way to stay together long-term, rather than applying for another, more expensive and less reliable type of visa
In April 2023, Laura Bohórquez, a Colombian sound editor and nanny, attended her first baseball game at Yankee Stadium with friends. Bohórquez, 28, had migrated to New York City on a tourist visa, hoping to advance her music career, a sector with few jobs in Colombia. That night she met Daniel Valverde, an Ecuadorian-American who works in cybersecurity. Their love story began after the game.
At first, they steered clear of discussing Bohórquez’s immigration status. But in October 2024, she received a letter from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) informing her that she had three months of legal stay left in the country. “I panicked. I am normally very calm and rarely experience anxiety, but that day I lost control,” Bohórquez says. “Daniel was aware of the political situation. He knew Donald Trump would win and that I could be at risk of deportation if I stayed any longer. So he suggested we get married.”
And marry they did. On January 3, 2025, they tied the knot at the New York City Registrar General’s office. Two weeks later, they filed Bohórquez’s Green Card application.
Like Bohórquez and Valverde, many couples with a foreign partner accelerated their decision to marry before Trump took office last January, according to Carolina Kripinski, an immigration attorney at Carrasquillo Law Group. New York media outlet The City reported that the New York City Marriage Bureau recorded a 33% increase in marriage license applications in November 2024, the month Trump was re-elected.
This rush to marry was also evident just before Trump’s first term. Between November 2016 and January 2017, 15,000 people got married, compared to only 11,700 in the same period the previous year. This represents a 28% increase, according to data from the New York Bureau of Marriage.
Private wedding service providers have also noted the increase just before Trump’s second term. “We saw a 150% hike in weddings from December 2023 to December 2024,” says Marta Bezkorovayna, founder of Perfect Wedding, a wedding planning firm in New York. “Most of the bookings were last minute, and I would say the main reason is that couples couldn’t get an appointment at the registry office because it was fully booked.”
To get married in New York City, couples must apply for a marriage license online and then schedule the ceremony. If immediate appointments are not available, they can choose a later date or hire a private company with a registered officiant to perform the ceremony. Then, the officiant, the newlyweds and their witnesses sign the license and file it with the registrar’s office, which subsequently issues the marriage certificate.
Trump campaigned on promises of mass deportations and the revocation of H-1B visas, a type of visa for skilled foreign workers that allows U.S. employers to hire them for approximately six years. Although immigration to the U.S. has increased since the pandemic, obtaining legal status remains costly and complex. For many, marriage is the most affordable, stable, and secure path to legal residency.
“Applying for an artist visa would have cost me between $6,000 and $10,000, while the family-based Green Card application cost me only $2,000,” says Lina Munar, a Colombian author who moved to New York to pursue a master’s degree in creative writing at New York University. While living in the city, she fell in love with Jacqueline Jackson, an American biologist from New Jersey.
They met at the Gay Pride march in New York in 2022. After nearly three years in a relationship, they knew they wanted to stay together. But in the summer of 2024, Trump’s possible re-election and the rise of conservative rhetoric made them feel their relationship was at risk. After exploring several visa options, Munar, 29, and Jackson, 28, decided to get married just three days after Trump’s re-election.
The complexity of other visas also plays into this trend. “For an artist visa, you must submit 40 pages of different forms and submit 1,700 pages of evidence,” Kripinski explains. “A family-based Green Card application only requires eight pages of forms and 300 pages of supporting documents.”
Marrying a U.S. citizen offers benefits, such as permanent residency, the ability to work in any field, unrestricted travel permits, and a Social Security number.
Ana Valdez, a Bolivian journalist, and Léo Vinaimont, an American store manager, met on a dating app in 2020 and began their relationship in Kansas City. In 2023, Valdez moved to New York to pursue a master’s degree, and the couple maintained a long-distance relationship until Vinaimont proposed marriage. He knew Valdez valued marriage but also recognized that this would protect her.
“I’m glad we got married in January because now we have an additional safety net — she’s not on the deportation list or facing tougher visa restrictions,” Vinaimont says.
Currently living in Wichita, Kansas, Valdez feels vulnerable in a state with a small Latino community. “Being married to a U.S. citizen offers protection on paper. But I don’t walk around with a sign that says, ‘I’m married to a U.S. citizen,’” she says. “We’ve seen legal residents and even citizens detained. When I’m alone, I know I’m more exposed, especially here in Kansas.”
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