AP - In this Saturday, May 9, 2009, photo San Angelo Mayor J.W. Lown greets arriving supporters to his election party at the Old Chicken Farm Art Center in San Angelo,Texas. Lown resigned suddenly May 19 and offered a stunning explanation: He was in love with a man who was an illegal immigrant and had gone to Mexico.
The mayor of this West Texas sheep ranching town offered a stunning explanation when he suddenly resigned: He was in love with a man who was an illegal immigrant and had gone to Mexico.
They had to move, he said, because there was no legal way for them to remain together in the United States.
"It wasn't a decision that any U.S. citizen should have to make," former Mayor J.W. Lown said in an interview from Mexico. "I left a home. I left a ranch. I left a promising political career."
His local prominence and his run for the border on the day he was supposed to be sworn in for a fourth term caused jaws to drop, but it also became a high-profile example of the thousands of Americans who face a similar choice — separate or move abroad — because they can't secure green cards for their partners like heterosexual spouses can.
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Promoting public awareness of the need for fairness in immigration policy particularly as it relates to the rights of same-sex bi-national couples in the United States who seek equal immigration rights; Providing information regarding political issues relating to gay immigration equality issues, rights and policy.
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