Gavel Gavel

In this very special episode, Thomas and Lydia Smith celebrate their 11th wedding anniversary in the most normal and romantic way possible: subjecting themselves to an extended interrogation about their marriage by a federal agent. After setting the scene in a (very slightly) parallel universe in which Thomas was born in Canada and committed a series of Nickelback-related misdemeanors before overstaying his student visa, Matt draws from his twenty years of experience in sitting through hundreds of immigration interviews to play out an unscripted simulation of what his clients and their U.S. citizen spouses go through when they are applying for residency through marriage.

We then reconvene to review how the Smiths did, and Matt takes us through some of the legal issues raised in this interview as well as some of the more interesting aspects of the residency process generally.

Finally, we discuss some of the weirder aspects of the law surrounding immigration through marriage beyond the facts of this interview, including (among many others):

--Do you really have to prove to the satisfaction of an immigration officer that your marriage includes sex?

--Why might the US government refuse to recognize a prior divorce from your home country?

--Will federal immigration authorities really recognize a Zoom wedding conducted from completely different continents?

--Can you bring multiple partners if you are coming from a country where polygamy is legal?

1. "Application to Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status," U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (1/20/2025 edition)

2. "Immigration Consequences of Criminal Activity," Congressional Research Service (5/28/21)

3. Matter of Peterson, 12 I&N Dec. 663 (BIA 1968)

4. "Kicking the INA Out of Bed: Abolishing the Consummation Requirement for Proxy Marriages," 22 Hastings J. Gender & L. 55 (2011)

5. "Second Wives Club: Mapping the Impact of Polygamy in U.S. Immigration Law," Claire A. Smearman, Berkeley Journal of Immigration Law (Dec. 2009)

GG67 - U.S. v. Dunn 8

Detective Henry finishes her direct testimony but not before the lawyers duke it out over admissibility of the body-worn camera footage that allegedly captures our hero admitting to his crime. How will the judge rule? PLUS: Matt brings us a case out of Massachusetts in which security footage that ceased to still exist was admitted. How did this happen?!

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We've got another witness! Detective Henry. And she's providing critical circles over stuff the jury totally already knew.

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Time for some game changing testimony.

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Time for our hotshot defense attorney to grill Agent Lairmore!

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We hear from the mangled corpse of victim #1. It's a medical wonder that he's even talking.

GG62 - U.S. v. Dunn 3

More like US v FUN. Join Matt Thomas and Lydia and we finally get to listen to real, authentic, 100% genuine simulated trial audio! It's the opening statements from each side.

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Matt takes us through some very interesting pre-trial motions.

GG60 - Lively v. Baldoni 59 - Wayfarer v. Lively 25

WE MADE ITTTTT! We're FINISHING the idiotic human rights abuse that is the Baldoni amended complaint! And to celebrate this immense accomplishment, we've got none other than MJ Morley for a double album extra longo!

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This is truly a game changer. We're honestly not sure what to think anymore now that we've found out the NYT worked on their story before publishing it. We're honestly shaken.

ALMOST DONE with this complaint! Only 1 more ep after this, with MJ Morley!