Short answer: the marriage can still lead to a green card, but if you married during the proceedings, the spouse petition cannot be approved unless an exemption applies. Getting a green card through marriage inside the United States usually takes two filings: the spouse petition (Form I-130), filed by the U.S. citizen, and the green card application (Form I-485), filed by the immigrant spouse. If you married while removal proceedings (a deportation case in immigration court) were pending, including while staying in the United States after a removal order, a rule keeps USCIS, the agency that reviews immigration applications, from approving the spouse petition unless an exemption (an exception to the rule) applies. The same rule applies again at the green card application stage. While the case is still pending, or while you stay in the United States after a removal order, the exemption that can still apply is usually the bona fide marriage exemption, which is for a real marriage: it lifts the rule only if the marriage is shown to be real by a higher standard of proof than usual. Your U.S. citizen spouse must make a written request with the petition and prove the marriage is real with clear and convincing evidence, meaning proof strong enough to give the decision maker a firm belief. If the exemption is not shown, the petition is denied, but that denial does not end every option. In some cases a petition can be considered again; see "The exemptions". And while your case is in immigration court, the immigration judge, not USCIS, decides the green card application, unless you were placed in court as an "arriving alien" (explained below). Whether you can apply from inside the United States also depends on how you entered, which other guides cover (see the end of "Who decides what"). As of October 2026.
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When the rule applies: the court filing date, not the day the notice arrived
The rule that blocks approval of the spouse petition covers a marriage that took place on or after November 10, 1986, while removal proceedings were pending. Below, that time is called "the restricted period": it runs from when the removal case starts until one of the endings explained below. If a decision in the case is taken to a federal court for review, the time while that court is reviewing it also counts.
For a case that starts with a Notice to Appear (Form I-862), the regulation says proceedings begin when the government files the notice with the immigration court. The day you received the notice and the hearing date written on it are not what counts, and neither is any other date on the notice, unless it shows when the court received it. Expedited removal is a process in which an immigration officer issues the removal order, generally without a hearing before an immigration judge. Expedited removal also has a restricted period under this rule: it starts on the day that order (Form I-860) is issued and handed to the person.
While you stay in the United States, the restricted period ends in one of these four ways:
- The immigration judge or the Board of Immigration Appeals, the appeals body for immigration judges' decisions and some USCIS decisions, terminates the proceedings, that is, closes the case without a removal order. Administrative closure, which only puts the case on hold, is not this.
- The government cancels the document that started the case, such as the Notice to Appear or an expedited removal order.
- A judge finds there is no legal ground to deport you.
- A federal court, reviewing the decision in your case, grants a petition for review or a habeas corpus petition, two kinds of requests asking a federal court to step in. "Grants" means the court decides the request in your favor. A court only reviewing the case does not end the restricted period.
Leaving the United States ends the restricted period in only two cases: you leave while a removal order is in place, or you leave within a voluntary departure period (permission to leave on your own by a deadline) that a judge granted together with an alternate removal order, one that takes effect if you do not leave in time. When the restricted period ends because you left, a marriage that took place during it stays under the rule; that ending does not by itself lift the rule. For this rule, that ending changes only one thing: a marriage that takes place after the restricted period ended is not covered. USCIS policy says that, in general, when a person leaves while a removal order is in place, as in the first of the two cases above, the order is treated as carried out, just as if the person had been removed. Under the regulations, if a green card applicant who is in removal proceedings leaves the United States, the application is treated as abandoned. Leaving can also keep you out of the country for years: by law, a person who leaves while a removal order is in place, or who leaves after a year or more of what the law counts as unlawful presence in the United States, generally cannot come back for 10 years unless the government gives permission or grants a waiver that lifts the bar. Talk with an immigration lawyer before you leave.
A removal order by itself does not end the restricted period. Staying in the United States after one keeps you inside the restricted period, so the rule also applies to a marriage that takes place while you stay after a removal order. For a case that started with a Notice to Appear, a marriage before the notice was filed with the court, or after the restricted period ended, is outside this rule. For these cases, the start date that counts is the court filing date, not the day the notice reached you. For a marriage outside this rule, the rule does not apply at either stage, the petition or the green card application. That does not change who decides the green card application: while the case is pending, the immigration judge still decides it, unless you were placed in court as an arriving alien.
The exemptions
USCIS policy lists six exemptions. Four apply when the marriage took place during the proceedings but the proceedings later ended in one of the four ways listed above: a judge found there was no legal ground to deport you, the government cancelled the document that started the case, the judge or the Board terminated the proceedings, or a federal court granted your petition for review or habeas petition. A restricted period that ended because you left the country is not one of these four. The fifth applies when, at the time the petition is filed, the immigrant spouse has lived outside the United States for at least two years after the marriage. The sixth is the bona fide marriage exemption. Because the first four depend on how the case ended and the fifth depends on two years abroad, for a couple who live in the United States while the case is still pending or after a removal order, the exemption that can still apply is usually the bona fide marriage exemption.
Requesting the bona fide marriage exemption takes no official form and no separate fee. The U.S. citizen spouse makes the request in writing and files it with the Form I-130. The request must say why the exemption applies and come with documents. The proof must show four things:
- You married in good faith, that is, honestly.
- The marriage is valid where it took place.
- It was not a marriage arranged as a way to get a green card, that is, not a sham to get around the immigration laws.
- No money or anything else of value was paid to anyone in exchange for filing the petition, for example to the U.S. citizen spouse. Paying a lawyer to help prepare the petition is not the kind of payment this means.
The regulation gives examples of the kinds of documents that can count: joint ownership of property, a lease for the home you share, records of shared finances, birth certificates of children you have together, and statements from people who know the marriage firsthand.
The regulation says the written request must be filed with the petition. USCIS policy says that if the request is missing, USCIS may ask for evidence of the exemption with a Request for Evidence or a Notice of Intent to Deny, but "may" is not a promise. Without an exemption, the petition is denied.
The denial does not end every option. The regulation leaves three paths, though none of them promises approval:
- If you can later prove the bona fide marriage exemption, your spouse can file a new petition or ask to reopen the denied petition (have it looked at again), and it can be considered.
- The same is true if, after the denial, the proceedings end in one of the four ways listed above, for example the judge terminates the proceedings or the government cancels the Notice to Appear. An ending by the immigrant spouse leaving does not count here.
- If the immigrant spouse has lived outside the United States for two years after the marriage, a new petition can be filed. Someone who is in the United States and has not yet lived outside the United States for two years after the marriage would have to leave the United States to use this path. As noted above, leaving with a removal order generally counts as being deported, leaving during proceedings gives up a pending green card application, and leaving can also bring the 10-year reentry bar described above, and approval of a new petition after the two years does not by itself remove that bar.
A denial of the spouse petition because the bona fide marriage exemption was not shown can be appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals. That is the only level of administrative appeal, meaning appeal within the government agencies, for that question. The new petition and reopening paths above are separate from this appeal.
At the green card stage, the same marriage rule applies. The immigrant spouse must also make a written request for the exemption, this time with the Form I-485, even if the spouse petition was already approved under the bona fide marriage exemption. If it was, that approval counts as the main proof of the exemption at this stage.
Who decides what
USCIS decides the spouse petition. The green card application (adjustment of status, which means becoming a permanent resident without leaving the United States, Form I-485) is different. If you are in removal proceedings, only the immigration judge can decide it, unless you were placed in proceedings as an arriving alien, explained below. USCIS policy adds that the judge keeps this authority even when the case has been administratively closed, which, despite the name, means the case was put on hold, not ended. The judge also keeps it when there is a final removal order that has not been carried out. This is about who has the power to decide. It does not mean the judge takes up such a case automatically; how an administratively closed case, or a case with a final removal order, comes back before the judge is governed by separate rules.
"Arriving alien" is a label for a person the rules treat as someone just arriving and asking to come in. The main example is someone who asked to come in at an airport, seaport or land border crossing and was not admitted. The label also covers someone at a port of entry who was only passing through the United States on the way to another country, and someone stopped at sea and brought into the United States. It stays even if the person was then paroled in. Parole lets a person into the country temporarily, but it does not count as being admitted, meaning formally let in by an officer, for example on a visa or through ESTA, the online authorization for visa-free visits. Someone who was admitted, or who entered without inspection (crossed the border without being checked by an officer), and was later placed in court is generally not an arriving alien. But take someone who is not in removal proceedings and has a green card application pending with USCIS. If that person travels abroad on advance parole, a travel permit obtained in advance, they come back on parole. If that application is later denied, they can be placed in court as an arriving alien.
If you were placed in court as an arriving alien, the judge decides the green card application only when all five of the following are true. If any one is missing, USCIS decides it:
- You properly filed the green card application with USCIS while in the United States.
- You traveled abroad and came back on advance parole to continue that earlier application.
- USCIS denied the application.
- When you returned, or after USCIS denied the application, the government placed you in court as an arriving alien.
- You ask the judge to decide that same application.
If you were placed in court as an arriving alien and you file a new green card application based on a new petition, such as a spouse petition, USCIS decides that new application.
Whether you can apply from inside the United States at all also depends on how you entered. Those are separate rules, covered in our guides on entering without inspection, entering on a tourist visa, and entering on ESTA.
What a lawyer looks at first
- The date of the marriage, compared with two dates: the date the Notice to Appear was filed with the court, and the date the restricted period ended, if it has.
- Whether the case is still pending or administratively closed, whether a removal order was issued, and whether that order has been carried out.
- How you came into the United States, and whether you were placed in proceedings as an arriving alien.
- What shows the marriage was real from the start, beyond the wedding certificate itself.
FAQ
We married after I received a Notice to Appear. Does this rule apply to us? If your case started with the Notice to Appear, a marriage before the government filed the notice with the immigration court is not covered; a marriage after that filing and before the restricted period ended is. The restricted period starts at that filing, not on the day the notice reached you or on the hearing date written on it.
Can my spouse still file the petition while my case is in court? Yes. A petition can be filed. If the marriage took place during the restricted period described above, it can be approved only if an exemption applies. For a couple whose case is still pending, or who stay in the United States after a removal order, that is usually the bona fide marriage exemption, shown with clear and convincing evidence.
Who decides my green card application while I am in court? Usually the immigration judge. USCIS decides it if you were placed in proceedings as an arriving alien, except in the narrow case where all five conditions listed in "Who decides what" are met.
General information only — not legal advice for your case. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
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