by Rex Wockner
U.S. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., has gone to bat for a binational gay couple, asking the Obama administration to let Genesio Oliveira return from Brazil to live with his husband, Tim Coco, in Massachusetts.
The couple married in 2005 and own a home in a Boston suburb.
Oliveira was sent home in August 2007 after losing an asylum case based on anti-gay persecution he said he experienced in Brazil. He also lost a case this year in which he sought to return to the U.S. based on his marriage to a U.S. citizen.
Kerry is a co-sponsor of a bill in Congress to extend spousal immigration rights to same-sex couples.
Gay couples can marry in Massachusetts and Connecticut.