Source: http://www.i-864.net/blog/?category=Prenuptial+agreement
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 00:44:57+00:00

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Ante-nuptial agreements can't waive I-864 support.
A third court has held that purported waivers of I-864 support are ineffective. Toure-Davis v. Davis, NO. WGC-13-916, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 42522 (Dist. M.D. Mar. 28, 2014). In Toure-Davis v. Davis the court gave both a narrow (but plausible) and a broad (but misguided) basis for holding the waiver was ineffective. I’m indebted to noted immigration attorney, Bob Gibbs, for bringing this decision to my attention today. Background. Plaintiff was a citizen of Ivory Coast who married the U.S. citizen defendant on July 29, 1998. On the day of marriage the parties signed an ante-nuptial agreement. The agreement set forth a general waiver, whereby both parties agreed broadly not to seek financial support from each other, were the marriage to end. The agreement contained no language specific to the I-864. Defendant later petitioned for Plaintiff’s lawful permanent residency in the U.S. and in the process executed an I-864. After the parties separated a state court action followed, which resulted in a settlement wherein Plaintiff received certain financial support. The federal district court action then followed, in which Plaintiff sought a damages award for I-864 support.
Narrow basis. Defendant argued that Plaintiff had waived her right to collect financial support under the I-864 by signing the ante-nuptial agreement. The District Court rejected this argument first because of the timing of the agreement. Since the agreement was signed before execution of the I-864, the court reasoned that the ante-nuptial agreement was modified by execution of the I-864. Since Plaintiff is a third-party beneficiary to the I-864, the reasoning goes, execution of that form gave her new contractual rights against the Defendant, and those rights modified the previously agreed-upon rights from the ante-nuptial agreement.
Even if sound, this reasoning wouldn’t prevent parties from making enforceable waivers of I-864 rights. The timing issue can be resolved by re-executing a waiver agreement after the sponsor signs the I -864. The I-864 is signed on Day 1; on Day 2 the ante-nuptial agreement is signed and the parties thus modify their private rights under the I-864. The modification argument could also, presumably, be bypassed by a more carefully-drafted waiver agreement. Contracts routinely contain modification clauses that explain how the agreement can and can’t be modified (e.g., in writing, etc.). Why not specify that execution of the I-864 does not modify the waiver agreement?
The duty of support is for the “benefit of federal and state taxpayers”, etc.
Defendant agreed to provide support to Plaintiff.
Defendant therefore cannot absolve himself of his contractual obligation with the U.S. Government by Plaintiff purportedly waiving any right to alimony or support via the ante-nuptial agreement.
First of all, the court doesn’t identify what rule makes it impossible for a sponsor to waive the duty of support. Is it because such an agreement would be void as against public policy? (Hence the citation to the public purpose behind the form). Or is it because the rights involved aren’t contractual in nature? (Hence the citation to “federal law”). This is yet the most recent example of confusion about what type of rights an I-864 beneficiary possesses. At least one federal court clearly believes they are contractual in nature, and rejects federal question subject matter jurisdiction because there is no federal statutory cause of action. See Winters, supra. Other courts, as in Toure-Davis, treat the rights as statutory. As long as this confusion persists, case law about I-864 enforcement will continue to be incoherent.
Unlike the Narrow Basis for the holding in Toure-Davis, the Broader Basis lends itself to no drafting solution. On this view beneficiaries can’t waive their right to collect I-864 support, so attorneys will want to be cautious about advising clients to try. In the Western District of Washington, where I practice, no state or federal court has considered waiver of I-864 support. I will continue to advise I-864 sponsors and joint-sponsors that a waiver may be possible, but that the prevailing view is that such agreements are unenforceable. But where the sponsor has already agreed to sign the I-864, she may as well attempt to protect herself with a waiver agreement.
This conclusion is not surprising, since I-864 support is not "alimony" or "maintenance" in any straight-forward sense.
But the court went on to hold that—language aside—the parties lacked authority to waive the sponsor’s support duty. First the court noted that the “immigration regulations” list the five circumstances that terminate support obligations, ant that “a prenuptial agreement or other waiver by the sponsored immigrant” does not terminate obligations under the regulations. This argument is probably weak since an individual may waive even constitutional rights, let alone regulatory rights. The fact that the regulations set forth terminating conditions does not necessarily entail that the parties cannot create other terminating conditions.
But the court went on to offer an interesting second argument in support of the non-waivability of support rights. It noted that under the INA the “Government” may not accept an I-864 unless that I-864 is “legally enforceable against the sponsor by the sponsored alien.” The language quoted is where the INA mandates creation of the document that became the I-864, which replaced the unenforceable I-134. But the court reasons, ‘the I-864 could not have been unenforceable if the government accepted it, the government did accept it, therefore the form must be enforceable.’ The syllogism seems perhaps a bit formalistic.
The deeper question underlying that argument is whether the parties’ rights are fundamentally statutory or contractual in nature. As noted elsewhere, courts are often unclear how they justify reliance on the INA when examining parties rights under the I-864. Some federal courts reject subject matter jurisdiction over I-864 disputes precisely because they are contractual in nature rather than posing a federal question. If the parties' rights are contractual, and not statutory in nature, the Shah court's reasoning seems misplaced. Following it's syllogism, another alternative is that the government just messed up: it accepted an I-864 that was actually unenforceable because the beneficiary had waived her rights, and if the government had known better it would have rejected the Affidavit. Moreover, the I-864 form could be modified by the USCIS to include a clause on the form itself reciting that it trumps any prior written agreement.
With the Shah decision now issued -- and only two other cases on point -- an attorney taking the bean-counting approach to law must advise her clients that prenuptial agreements cannot waive I-864 rights. Compare Erler v. Erler, Civ. No. 12–2793, 2013 WL 6139721, at *2 (N.D.Cal. Nov. 21, 2013) (prenuptial agreements can't waive I-864 support) with Blain v. Herrell, Civ. No. 10–72, 2010 WL 2900432, at *7–8 (D.Haw. July 21, 2010) (yes they can).
Prenuptial agreement cannot waive enforcement? Erler v. Erler (N.D. Cal. Nov. 21, 2013).
A second federal district court has weighed in on whether a prenuptial agreement may waive an immigrant-beneficiary’s right to seek enforcement of the I-864. Previously, in Blain v. Herrell, a district court in Hawaii had concluded that a premarital agreement could waive a beneficiary’s rights to enforce the I-864, on the reasoning that the beneficiary was entitled to bargain away her own private rights if she chose. No. 10-00072 ACK-KSC, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 76257 (D. Haw. July 21, 2010). In Erler v. Erler the parties entered into a premarital agreement stating that “neither party shall seek or obtain any form of alimony or support from the other.” CV-12-02793-CRB, 2013 WL 6139721 (N.D. Cal. Nov. 21, 2013). When the immigrant-beneficiary brought a contract action on the I-864 to recover support arrearages, the sponsor sought summary judgment, arguing that the premarital agreement rendered the I-864 contract “void.” The court rejected this contention on two grounds. First, the court held that premarital agreement could not waive rights under the I-864, as the premarital agreement was executed before the I-864. These facts distinguished Blain v. Herrell, in which the premarital agreement was executed after the I-864. Second, the court held that the defendant-sponsor could not “unilaterally absolve himself of his contractual obligation with the government by contacting with a third party.” This reasoning fundamentally departs from Blain v. Herrell, where the court reasoned that a beneficiary’s private rights were her own to waive if she chose. Indeed, the Department of Homeland Security itself has opined that a beneficiary may elect to waive her right to enforcement of the I-864.
The Erler case injects new uncertainty into whether a sponsor and beneficiary can waive enforcement of the I-864. In my view Erler got it wrong: a beneficiary's I-864 rights are in the nature of private rights under a contract. Normally a contract beneficiary - including a third-party beneficiary - may elect to bargain away her rights. By contrast, it is less likely that a sponsor could contract his way out of his obligation to repay means-tested public benefits received by an immigrant-beneficiary (the second of two promises made under the I-864). This promise gives no bundle of rights to the beneficiary, who therefore has nothing to waive.
The Erler court also suggested that allowing waiver of I-864 enforcement would serve an end-run around the policy basis for the I-864. This reasoning circles back on a common area of confusion: how should courts account for the statutory framework behind the I-864? Courts commonly treat I-864 rights as a confusing hybrid of statutory and contract rights. Why and how is the policy basis for the I-864 relevant to the waiver issue? Is it because the premarital agreement was rendered void (i.e., as against public policy)? The Erler court does not tell us. If courts look beyond the four corners of the I-864 to determine parties' rights they should be clear about why they are doing so.

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