The United States awards about a million green cards each year, and Danielle Wright is hoping to get one of them. Her odds should be good for several reasons. First, she’s married to a U.S. citizen -- a former marine.
“He was sent to Ramadi – Iraq, so he saw a lot of action," she says. "He was in an IED attack at one stage.”
As a result, Tim Wright suffered more than broken bones.
“He did sustain a lot of injuries. He lost some of his hearing and has traumatic brain injury from one of the blasts," Danielle Wright says.
He was also diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, which might have served a defense back in Virginia when he was charged with killing another young man. Instead, Wright insisted he was innocent.
“A lot of evidence that should have been presented at trial wasn’t, and Tim was unfortunately sentenced to 63 years in prison.”
Wright found life in prison lonely, and he signed up with a group that pairs prisoners with pen pals – which is how Danielle found him.
“Me being a Royal Australian Navy veteran, I thought well we’ve got that common interest.”
But they lived 10,000 miles apart, so their relationship evolved on paper and by phone. Danielle began fighting for Tim’s freedom.
“We were fighting his wrongful conviction," she recalls. "I thought, ‘He won’t be in prison for that much longer,’ not realizing what the U.S. system is like.”
She did visit and discovered one big difference. She’s just under five feet tall, while Tim is six-foot-two.
“So we make an interesting couple," she says with a chuckle.
They married at the Buckingham Correctional Center in 2016, and two years later made the first application for permanent residency – what’s commonly called a green card.
Danielle seemed like the perfect candidate.
“We paid thousands of dollars for the application. My sister-in-law is a co-sponsor on the application, and I have everything I need here. I have a home, a car, a job that’s been promised to me if I get my visa.”
But after making repeated applications online over a period of more than five years, she needs one more thing – an interview with a federal government official, and no one can tell her when that might happen.
Under current law, each country is awarded seven percent of available green cards, which means people from populous places like India and China – with about one and a half billion people each -- have the longest wait, usually years. Australia, on the other hand, has a population of just over 25 million.
Danielle Wright is a medical technician with years of experience in the operating room, but she’s here on a 90-day tourist visa, and time is running out.
“And it’s upsetting, because you hear stories about people walking across the border, and I’ve done the right things. I’ve been sitting patiently, waiting. I love Virginia. I love the people. I love the atmosphere. I love the culture. I’ve only been here a short period of time, but everybody’s so welcoming, and kind and friendly. I want to make this my home.”
She’s reached out to several politicians, but they’ve made no promises, and Wright claims an assistant to Congressman Bob Good warned her to be on a flight back to Australia without delay.
