The reason for green card marriage interviews is that the government wants to make sure that the marriage is legitimate. When someone who is a citizen of the United States gets married to someone who is not, they can use that marriage to justify getting a green card for their new spouse. The government is worried that people may attempt to scam the system.
For instance, maybe someone came to the United States on a student visa. It is about to run out, but they do not want to return to their home country. They ask a friend to legally marry them so that they can get a green card, even though the two are not actually in a romantic relationship. Later, they just plan to seek an annulment or a divorce.
But how common is this? It’s not that common at all. For instance, one recent bust led to charges for 100 people. That sounded massive and made headlines, but you have to consider that around 1 million immigrants enter the United States every year. If 100 of them engaged in a scam, that’s one hundredth of a percent. The vast majority of immigrants never even consider this or engage in any type of illegal activity. Headlines or not, it rarely happens.
Even so, the government does take this process seriously. If you’re considering trying to get a green card for your spouse, you need to know exactly what steps to take, what questions to ask and what you can do to make everything go as smoothly as possible.