“It’s been a long time financially supporting someone who abuses me. How can an American living at . . . poverty level provide a home for themselves separate from a home for their abuser? And living with an abuser, how can the American be safe or have the right to pursue happiness in their own home that they have paid for with their own labor? Rather, the American is an indentured servant to the abuser, or maybe an unhappy slave.”*
* Email from anonymous U.S. citizen to the author (March 5, 2019, 10:25 AM) (on file with author) (commenting on her obligation to financially support a man who had abused her because of an affidavit of support filed in connection with the abuser’s immigration application).
Clinical Professor of Law, Michigan State University College of Law. I would like to thank David B. Thronson for his support and insight in preparing this article and Daryl Thompson, Olivia Rose Beale, and Shannon T. Hickey for their research assistance.
