Durbin, Schatz, Gillibrand Introduce Child Marriage Prevention Act

08.02.24

Durbin, Schatz, Gillibrand Introduce Child Marriage Prevention Act

New legislation takes steps to address child marriage domestically

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL), Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and U.S. Senators Brian Schatz (D-HI) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) introduced the Child Marriage Prevention Act of 2024, which would take steps to reduce child marriage across the United States.

According to leading advocacy groups on this issue, data shows that between 2000 and 2018, more than 300,000 minors were married in the United States, most of whom were 16 or 17 years of age. However, some of these marriages included girls as young as 10 and girls who married men who were decades older. In addition, between the years 2007 and 2017, more than 8,500 marriage-based visa petitions involving at least one minor were approved by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the majority of which involved U.S. citizen men who had married children overseas.

"While the United States has long worked to address the scourge of child marriage internationally, our federal government has failed to take meaningful steps to address this issue in our own backyard. Child marriage is a significant problem domestically, and it overwhelmingly affects underage girls who are married to adult men, often with dire consequences for their life outcomes. This loss of dignity and independence is unacceptable," said Durbin. "Our bill builds on the work of countless survivors and advocates across the country to end child marriage in the United States. It is a powerful statement of our priorities as a nation and something that will change the futures of hundreds of thousands of young girls if enacted."

"It's absurd and unacceptable that despite everything we know about the horrific outcomes of child marriage, hundreds of thousands of young girls are still forced into unions they want no part of," said Schatz. "Our bill takes meaningful steps toward finally ending this practice in the United States by updating our immigration laws and encouraging states to ban child marriage for good."

"Child marriage leaves girls vulnerable to abuse and exploitation. It is a wildly outdated practice that has no place in 21st century American society. This bill makes commonsense changes to help eliminate child marriage across the United States and protect our kids. I look forward to getting it passed," said Gillibrand.

Specifically, the Child Marriage Prevention Act of 2024 would:

• Establish a National Commission to Combat Child Marriage to study, evaluate, and report on eliminating child marriage in the United States;
• Require a report by the Government Accountability Office examining child marriage across the United States;
• Incentivize states to ban child marriage (such as through increased Violence Against Women Act grant funding);
• Establish a competitive grant program for eligible states that create state-based task forces to examine child marriage in their individual states;
• Prohibit child marriage from occurring on federally funded land or buildings or property owned by the federal government (such as military bases); and
• Instruct the Attorney General to promulgate a model state statute that prohibits child marriage.

This bill would also close immigration loopholes and newly require U.S. petitioners to be at least 18 years of age to petition for spousal and fiancé(e) visas and to have been at least 18 years of age at the time of marriage for that marriage to be valid for immigration purposes. It would also require that individuals sponsored for such visas be at least 18 years of age at the time of the petition (or, in rare instances, be at least 16 years of age if the Secretary of Homeland Security grants a waiver for compelling humanitarian reasons).

In addition, the legislation would amend how a proxy marriage (in which one of the two parties is not physically present for the ceremony) can be established for immigration purposes, replacing a problematic consummation requirement with a requirement that parties to a marriage have previously met in person within two years of the date of the ceremony. Finally, the bill would require a report by the Government Accountability Office examining the extent to which noncitizens who were under the age of 18 at the time of marriage have been brought into the U.S. through U.S. citizen and LPR-sponsored spousal provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act.

The Child Marriage Prevention Act of 2024 is endorsed by the following organizations: Tahirih Justice Center; National Alliance to End Sexual Violence; Jewish Women International; Esperanza United; Resiliency Foundation; Global Hope 365; Ujima, the National Center on Violence Against Women in the Black Community; Womankind; The Person Center; Indiana Youth Services Association; Naila Amin Foundation; SK Sultana LLC; ASISTA; Raksha; National Resource Center on Domestic Violence; Catholic Charities Fort Wayne South Bend; Daya Houston; Too Young to Wed; and Legal Momentum.

"Girls everywhere are only as safe as the weakest law allows, and this bill acknowledges the many ways current U.S. law fails to protect girls here and abroad from this human rights abuse," said Casey Carter Swegman, Director of Policy at the Tahirih Justice Center. "For years, the U.S. has focused on ending child marriage in other countries but has overlooked the issue here at home. We are grateful to Senator Dick Durbin for his steadfast support and dedication to introducing the Child Marriage Prevention Act, which tackles the issue by encouraging states to take action and updating immigration law to close loopholes that allow for the exploitation of children under the guise of marriage."

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