Congress is currently trying to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) this week. This Act, as it stands, allows battered spouses to petition for their own legal status, should they be in an extremely abusive relationship where their U.S. citizen or permanent resident spouse has isolated them from friends and family, beaten them physically, verbally threatened them with deportation, sexually forced themselves onto them, psychologically demeaned them, and controlled all their marital finances. It is essentially a romantic and mutual relationship that turns into a slave-master relationship. The lack of status makes an awfully abusive relationship worse because the abusive spouse knows he can use the immigrant spouse's lack of a status as a tool to coerce, manipulate, and control. It is not uncommon to hear an abuser tell their immigrant spouse, "If you call the police, they will never believe you because you are illegal - they will deport you and you will never...
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