Naila Amin was just 13 years old when her parents took her from her home in Queens, New York, to Pakistan so that she could marry her 26-year-old cousin. At the time, the legal age for marriage in her home state was 14.

Under the Immigration and Nationality Act, there is no minimum age requirement for a person to sponsor a spouse or fiancée to come to the U.S. In practice, this means an American child can sponsor their foreign spouse provided the marriage is legal in both the country where it happened and the state where the couple intends to live. Amin’s parents reasoned that if they married her shortly before her 14th birthday, she could file for her new husband’s visa right away.

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