By NAN Contributor
News Americas, NEW YORK, NY, Tues. Oct. 30, 2018: While the Donald Trump administration is ramping up deportation and shuttering the door on legal immigration, TLC is keeping the spotlight on the K-1 Visa with the reality TV show, ‘90 Day Fiance.’
The show has offered a unique look into the world of international dating and matrimony as U.S. nationals sponsor overseas partners on the K-1 visa and the couple then have 90 days to get married or the visiting partner will have to return home. It first aired in January 2014.
The current Season 6 of the Show sees Jamaican Conroy ‘Jay’ Smith, 20, making his appearance as the fiancé of 31-year-old American, Ashley Martson.
Martson, a bartender and mother of two from Mechanicsburg, PA, is engaged to Smith, a 20-year-old tattoo artist from Port Maria, Jamaica.
She was previously engaged twice but called off both engagements because the men had cheated on her. However, after taking break from men, she met Smith at a bar during a vacation to Jamaica.
Although they parted ways after a whirlwind romance in Jamaica, Martson revealed Smith contacted her on social media once she returned to the United States.
When she subsequently returned to Jamaica to visit, Smith proposed marriage after only eight days together. Martson then applied for the K-1 visa for Smith.
She says she is completely confident they will get married in the 90 days and revealed that they have a lot sex, sometimes even in public.
“I think intimacy is really important, sometimes I just pull the car over and have sex in the middle of the road,” she said during the second episode of the series.
“I definitely feel the pressure, but I need to keep him satisfied, including like having sex three times a day,” she said.
The K-1 visa permits the foreign-citizen fiancé(e) of a U.S. citizen to travel to the United States and marry his or her U.S. citizen sponsor within 90 days of arrival.
The foreign-citizen will then apply for adjustment of status to a permanent resident (LPR) with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).
Because a fiancé(e) visa permits the holder to immigrate to the U.S. and marry a U.S. citizen shortly after arrival in the United States, the fiancé(e) must meet some of the requirements of an immigrant visa. Eligible children of K-1 visa applicants receive K-2 visas.
The number of fiancée visas issued to foreign nationals has tripled from 12,088 to 38,403 a year since the late 1990s, signifying the trend in the past two decades. Last year, according to State Department data, 34,797 were issued.
