How to Deal When Divorce and Immigration Collide
episode
Off the Fence with Karen Covy: Mastering Decision Making, Divorce & More
41 min
1 speaker
7 chapters
transcribed 1 month ago
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is the focus of this episode and who is the guest?
Hello, and welcome to Off the Fence, a podcast where we deconstruct difficult decision-making so we can discover what keeps us stuck, and more importantly, how we can get unstuck and start making even tough decisions with confidence. I'm your host, Karen Covey, a former divorce lawyer, mediator, and arbitrator turned coach, author, and entrepreneur. And now, without further ado, let's get on with the show. With me today, I have the pleasure of speaking with Lucia Ramirez-Levias. And Lucia is a collaboratively trained divorce attorney and partner at Dubois-Levias Law Group, a woman-owned boutique family law firm in Seattle. She's practiced family law exclusively since 2008. Her passion is helping families navigate divorce with dignity, clarity, and fairness because she knows firsthand the lifelong impact these transitions have on children and parents alike.
As a collaborative divorce attorney, Lucia guides couples through a structured, team-based process that keeps decisions in their hands, not the courtroom. Lucia's goal is to de-escalate conflict, to ensure financial security, and help families build agreements that support their futures. Divorce is a pivotal moment in a family's life, but with the right guidance, it can be a positive transition. Lucia, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. Thank you for being here. And I'm curious, I'm always curious when I speak with divorce lawyers, what drew you to family law?
Interesting, because I wasn't initially drawn to family law. I was interested in immigration law because I have a lot of interest in international work and kind of thought that that's what I would do. But I also have a history of working in nonprofit organizations before I went to law school, working with families and children. So I had a particular interest in youth development work. And so after I graduated from law school, I tried out immigration law and I actually realized it wasn't what I was expecting it to be. And someone said, hey, there's a little firm over here in Seattle that is doing family law. Maybe you should give that a try. And I thought, OK, well, that's what everyone's been telling me to try. So let me try it. And ended up finding that it was really aligned with my background, my interests. And I just really like working with people and family laws where you get to practice the law, but you also get to counsel people.
And so it was sort of a perfect mix for me. That makes so much sense. and,
I love the background in international or immigration law and then going to family law. And that's really one of the things that I wanted to talk to you about, because there aren't a lot of lawyers out there who meld both specialties in the way that you do. And I know that there's so much in the news about immigration, and there are a lot of families that I've worked with that have International couples, right? So mom is from one country. Dad is from another country. Sometimes the child is the only born in America person in the family. And then the family or the parents decide to get divorced. How does all of that work? How does the international aspect of divorce complicate divorce? Or what are the issues that parents in that kind of situation, what do they have to think about above and beyond the divorce? It does complicate things. And at the same time,
the underlying agreements that we have to make are somewhat similar. But my background is similar to a lot of the clients that I represent, where I have one parent who's from Peru and one parent who's from the United States. And so I grew up with that blended family, and I grew up sort of knowing that there were – There were a lot of things between my Peruvian family and my United States family that were different from each other culturally, and then all of the visa and immigration aspects of it. And so I was familiar with that kind of family. And in Seattle, it turns out that we have a lot of families also that have at least one foreign-born parent. And so what happens a lot of times is that you have a couple who maybe came to the United States for a job. For example, in a high tech field is kind of a sort of a stereotypical case that we might have where someone comes over and they come over on a work visa and they bring their spouse with them. And that spouse is on a dependent visa.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the focus of this episode and who is the guest?
0:10–5:45
2
Why did Lucia move from immigration law to family law?
5:45–11:00
3
How can a dependent visa become a weapon in a divorce?
11:00–17:22
4
What is collaborative divorce and how does it help binational families?
17:22–23:05
5
How does the Hague Convention protect children in international custody disputes?
23:05–28:24
6
What passport and travel restrictions should be built into a parenting plan?
28:24–34:02
7
How are foreign assets handled in a Washington state divorce?
34:02–41:14