This AP report is deeply disturbing:

WASHINGTON: Thousands of requests by men originally from other countries, including Pakistan, to bring in child and adolescent brides to live in the United States were approved over the past decade, according to government data obtained by AP news agency. In one case, a 49-year-old man applied for admission for a 15-year-old girl. The approvals are legal: the Immigration and Nationality Act does not set minimum age requirements. And in weighing petitions for spouses or fiancées, US Citizenship and Immigration Services goes by whether the marriage is legal in the home country and whether the marriage would be legal in the state where the petitioner lives.

Nota bene: Islam is not a religion based on ethics, but on the actions and opinions of Mohammed. Those countries whose legal system mirrors Islamic law (such as Iraq, Pakistan, Nigeria, and Turkey) allow marriage without age limits, because of his example:

The Prophet engaged me when I was a girl of six (years). [M]y mother, Um Ruman, came to me while I was playing in a swing with some of my girl friends. She called me, and I went to her, not knowing what she wanted to do to me. She caught me by the hand and made me stand at the door of the house. I was breathless then, and when my breathing became all right, she took some water and rubbed my face and head with it. Then she took me into the house. There in the house I saw some Ansari women who said, “Best wishes and Allah’s Blessing and a good luck.” Then she entrusted me to them and they prepared me (for the marriage). Unexpectedly Allah’s Apostle came to me in the forenoon and my mother handed me over to him, and at that time I was a girl of nine years of age (Bukhari 5.58.234).

Mohammed was 54 years old at that time. That the US should work so hard in some realms to guard children from unwarranted sexual advances, and turn a blind eye to child marriage is appalling.

There were more than 5,000 cases of adults petitioning on behalf of minors and nearly 3,000 examples of minors seeking to bring in older spouses or fiancés, according to the data requested by the Senate Homeland Security Committee in 2017 and compiled into a report. Some victims of forced marriage say the lure of a US passport combined with lax US marriage laws are partly fuelling the petitions…“It indicates a problem. It indicates a loophole that we need to close,” said Republican Sen Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, the chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee.

Toute suite, please. Of the thousands of petitions, only 2% were declined. America can do better.