SAN FRANCISCO, CA—March 11, 2008— Senators John Kerry (D-MA) and Gordon Smith (R-OR) successfully secured a provision to repeal the discriminatory travel and immigration ban on HIV-positive individuals today as part of the Senate's legislation to reauthorize PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. The underlying legislation, authored by Senators Joe Biden (D-DE) and Richard Lugar (R-IN), is expected to be considered by the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations this week.

“This is a monumental first step toward ending the discrimination the LGBT community faces under current US immigration laws,” said Michael Lim, Vice President of the national grassroots organization Out4Immigration, a group dedicated to raising awareness about the discrimination LGBT Americans and their foreign partners face under current US immigration law.

“For many years, the only long-term way around this ban was for HIV-positive people to be sponsored by a family member, similar to the immigration process,” explained Lim. “Under current immigration law, the word ‘family’ does not apply to gays and lesbians.” The majority of HIV-positive people denied entry because of the ban have been gay men, many with American partners who are shut out from the ‘family’ option.

“This is similar to the larger problem of gay and lesbian American citizens not being able to sponsor foreign partners for green cards. It’s been an inhumane practice in this country for a long time,” said Lim.

According to the Human Rights Campaign, who along with Out4Immigration has repeatedly called for an end to this practice, the travel and immigration ban prohibits HIV-positive foreign nationals, students, and tourists from entering the US unless they obtain a special waiver that only allows for short-term travel. Longer-term options can only be obtained using the family member sponsorship not available to gay and lesbian couples.

The ban was originally enacted in 1987, and explicitly restated in 1993, despite efforts in the public health community to remove the ban when Congress reformed US immigration law in the early 1990s. While immigration law currently excludes immigrants with any “communicable disease of public health significance” from entering the US, only HIV is explicitly named in the statute. For all other illnesses, the Secretary of Health and Human Services retains the ability, with the medical expertise of his department, to determine which illnesses truly pose a risk to public health.

Senators Kerry and Smith introduced legislation, the HIV Non-Discrimination in Travel and Immigration Act (S. 2486), in December 2007 to repeal the ban. Representative Barbara Lee introduced the legislation in August 2007 in the House of Representatives (H.R. 3337).

“We hope that PEPFAR is reauthorized shortly and this major barrier to allowing all loving couples a chance to be together in the US is removed,” said Lim.

While the repeal of the discriminatory travel and immigration ban on HIV-positive individuals will allow foreign gays and lesbians with this illness some of the same options as their HIV-negative counterparts, there is still a long way to go until equal immigration rights are available to all.

“The good news is that those who are HIV-positive may soon be able to enter the US on work or student visas, in addition to travel,” said Lim. “This is often a first step that same-sex binational couples take in order to live together in the US.

“It will take the passage of the Uniting American Families Act (H.R. 2221; S.1328) for gay and lesbian American citizens to have the same rights to sponsor a foreign partner for permanent residency as is available to heterosexuals,” explained Lim.

“Out4Immigration remains hopeful that the UAFA could be attached to legislation that would move it as swiftly through Congress as the expected repeal of the travel and immigration ban.”
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For more information:
Out4Immigration: http://www.out4immigration.org
The Uniting American Families Act (H.R. 2221): http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:HR02221:
The Uniting American Families Act (S.1328): http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:SN01328:

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Out4Immigration addresses the widespread discriminatory impact of US immigration laws on the lives of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and HIV+ people and their families through education, outreach, advocacy and the maintenance of a resource and support network. For more information, visit http://www.out4immigration.org. To schedule
interviews with same-sex binational couples who are available to speak with the media on this issue, including Spanish-speaking couples, please contact Amos Lim, amos [at] out4immigration.org, 415-375-3765 or Kathy Drasky at kathy [at] out4immigration.org, 415-606-2085.