Getting Federal Benefits To Gay Couples: It's Complicated

by CARRIE JOHNSON
October 22, 2013 3:15 AM

It has been four months since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a law that defined marriage as between a man and a woman. The ruling paved the way for thousands of same-sex married couples to receive federal benefits, and a special group of government lawyers has been working to make that happen.

Their marching orders came from President Obama only hours after the high court threw out part of the Defense of Marriage Act. And the task was clear: review more than 1,000 rules and laws that cover all kinds of federal benefits to make sure gay and lesbian couples get their due.

"This is a civil rights matter," Attorney General Eric Holder says. "In many ways, I think it's akin to the struggle that African-Americans went through in the '50s and the '60s to demand equal treatment, to be allowed to enjoy all the benefits that flow to a person who is nothing more than an American citizen."

And many benefits are starting to flow. Federal employees in same-sex marriages can extend health and life insurance coverage to their spouses. Immigration authorities say they'll review petitions from people in same-sex relationships the same way they review requests from opposite-sex couples. And at the IRS, tax officials say legally married gay and lesbian couples can now file jointly.

"Obviously the decision generated a lot of excitement for a lot of people, but our job has been to make the promise of that decision, the words on the page in the Supreme Court's opinion, real for real people," says Assistant Attorney General Stuart Delery, who leads the effort to implement the Supreme Court ruling for the Justice Department.

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http://www.npr.org/2013/10/22/237196335/getting-federal-benefits-to-gay-couples-its-complicated