{"id":205,"date":"2009-06-14T09:01:21","date_gmt":"2009-06-14T15:01:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.messersmithlaw.com\/?p=205"},"modified":"2026-08-15T23:19:28","modified_gmt":"2026-08-16T05:19:28","slug":"widows-of-us-citizens-will-be-granted-deferred-action","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.messersmithlaw.com\/?p=205","title":{"rendered":"Widows of US Citizens Will Be Granted Deferred Action"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>US Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano recently announced that widows of US Citizens will be granted deferred action for two years.\u00a0 Previously, foreign nationals who married US citizens via the <a href=\"https:\/\/messersmithlaw.com\/green-card\/marriage-green-card.html\" target=\"_blank\">Marriage Green Card<\/a> but whose US citizen spouse died before they were able to obtain benefits were not eligible for immigration benefits.\u00a0 The DHS will now recognize that these widows along with their unmarried children under 18 years of age the right to remain in the US and will defer initiation of <a href=\"https:\/\/messersmithlaw.com\/visas\/removal-deportation.html\">removal proceedings<\/a>, cancel current removal proceedings and will accept applications foe humanitarian reinstatement for those who have had petitions revoked.<\/p>\n<p>These new benefits apply to all spouse of US citizens and their unmarried children under 18 years who were married for less than two years at the time of the US citizen spouse&#8217;s death.\u00a0 In addition, the widows may be granted work authorization provided they may show economic necessity.\u00a0 The DHS is encouraging the legislation of new laws which would allow these widows the ability to apply for permanent residence as well.<\/p>\n<p>See the entire press release <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dhs.gov\/ynews\/releases\/pr_1244578412501.shtm\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>US Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano recently announced that widows of US Citizens will be granted deferred action for two years.\u00a0 Previously, foreign nationals who married US citizens via the Marriage Green Card but whose US citizen spouse died before they were able to obtain benefits were not eligible for immigration benefits.\u00a0 The &#8230; <a title=\"Widows of US Citizens Will Be Granted Deferred Action\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.messersmithlaw.com\/?p=205\" aria-label=\"Read more about Widows of US Citizens Will Be Granted Deferred Action\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,41,57],"tags":[182,192,208],"class_list":["post-205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marriage-green-card","category-removal","category-widows-of-us-citizens","tag-marriage-green-card","tag-removal","tag-widows-of-us-citizens"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Widows of US Citizens Will Be Granted Deferred Action - US Immigration Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.messersmithlaw.com\/?p=205\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Widows of US Citizens Will Be Granted Deferred Action - US Immigration Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"US Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano recently announced that widows of US Citizens will be granted deferred action for two years.\u00a0 Previously, foreign nationals who married US citizens via the Marriage Green Card but whose US citizen spouse died before they were able to obtain benefits were not eligible for immigration benefits.\u00a0 The ... 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