One doesn't often have the opportunity to make a quick remark that might affect the course of U.S. policy. I got that chance in an unexpected conversation with Barack Obama in 2007.

Eric Manriquez, a U.S. citizen, has been legally married to Juan Rivera, an undocumented immigrant, for five years in California, yet Rivera can't apply for a green card through marriage as heterosexual spouses can, because the federal government doesn't recognize their union.

I'm British and have lived in the UK my whole life. I never expected to find myself with a partner from another country. Having to deal with the distance was hard enough, but what happens when one partner can't expect to be sponsored for citizenship in the other's country?

You decided to exclude the gays, the people who worry everyday that their partner will be deported, who watch their partners cry because they can't visit a sick father, who believe in the justice we seek for all immigrants because the suffering is identical and must end for us all.

Lesbian and gay binational couples remain shut out of green cards and fiancé(e) visas. As a result, LGBT families are still torn apart, forced into exile or left fighting to remain together in this country. None of them feel that we have already won, and to say that is an insult to their struggle.

LGBT families are standing up and challenging everyone to see their humanity. By reaching out to our neighbors, families, co-workers, fellow congregants, employers and friends, and by living open and honest lives, we have changed the hearts and minds of more than 100 million Americans.

LGBT undocumented immigrants live in the shadows, marginalized by society's bias based on sexual orientation or gender identity and immigration status. Shedding light on their numbers is a start in getting them out of the dark.

Long before immigration reform was the hot topic it is today, Judy Rickard and her wife, Karin Bogliolo, were in the trenches spreading the word about the harsh reality for same-sex binational couples trying to remain together in the U.S.

Homeland Security is avoiding the deportation of some same-sex partners. Still, 50 LGBT and immigration advocacy groups have asked President Obama to announce an official freeze on deportations of LGBT people until DOMA can be decided, but no action has been taken.

President Obama, you can ensure that Becky and Sanne's green card petition is not denied but put on hold until either the Supreme Court strikes down the Defense of Marriage Act or Congress passes an immigration reform bill that includes the gay partner provision you put forward.

The fact is simply that any remaining opposition to the inclusion of gay families in immigration reform is marginal, and it is not the official policy of the vast immigration coalition network that is now working tightly with the LGBT community.

A few days ago I spoke to a friend about the need for immigration reform in this country, reform that would honor and respect both this nation and those who seek citizenship here. My friend asked me why, as an advocate for LGBT equality, I care about immigration. This is my response.

After 16 years it's clear that the only thing the Defense of Marriage Act defends is institutionalized bigotry. The letter we received from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, a division of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, solidifies that fact. It was all there in black and white.

While the White House has said it cannot approve green cards for lesbian and gay spouses because of DOMA, what it has failed to tell the LGBT community is that it can hold those applications -- rather than deny them -- as the courts and Congress decide DOMA's ultimate fate.

We must immediately stand together and stand up for our equal rights and demand the immediate and full repeal of DOMA, so that upstanding individuals, such as Allan Spyere, are not to face such dastardly consequences.

Lenora Brandoli's son John married his long-time partner, Trinidad native Michael Thomas, last year. Sadly, Thomas was recently denied a stay in his deportation case, leaving the family in fear that one of their own will be forced to leave them.

Gay binational couples are up in arms because the guidelines do not specify gay unauthorized immigrants married or partnered to American citizens as cases that should be "carefully considered for prosecutorial discretion on a case-by-case basis."

Luke and I had been best friends for a couple of years when we faced a decision that many gay friends confront: whether to take our relationship to a romantic level. We soon learned that as a binational couple, we would face even greater challenges.

For the same reasons that we demand that immigration reform include protections for same-sex binational couples, we join our colleagues in being equally adamant that the number of family sponsorship visas not be reduced, and that no categories of family sponsorship be eliminated.