One lesbian couple’s winding path to marriage leads to a historic first in Bolivia

SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia (AP) — Like many newlyweds, Fabiana Justiniano and Scarlett Rocha grow misty-eyed when they reminisce about their wedding day: racing from the civil registry to get their hair and makeup done, dancing in their white dresses late into the night with more than a hundred friends and relatives.

“We didn’t expect it to be so beautiful,” Justiniano, 29, said last Saturday from the couple’s home in Bolivia’s eastern city of Santa Cruz, which they share with three dogs and four cats. “It was really, really great.”

Their Aug. 7 wedding was more than a personal milestone, it was a political one, too.

It was Bolivia’s first same-sex civil marriage — the culmination of a grueling legal struggle in a religiously and socially conservative nation whose constitution defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Although the court decision allowing their civil marriage applies only to them, experts said their victory could set a precedent for other Bolivian couples.

“When I saw the marriage certificate on the table, I felt this weight being lifted,” said Rocha, also 29. “This sense of peace came, where I was able to let down my guard and really enjoy what it means to be married.”

While Bolivia isn’t alone in its stance across predominantly Roman Catholic South America, the continent’s most populous countries, including Brazil, Colombia and Argentina, have allowed same-sex couples to marry for years. Central America and the Caribbean remain more conservative on LGBTQ+ rights, with fewer legal protections for same-sex couples.

Legal challenges mounted by gay and lesbian couples — like the one brought by Justiniano and Rocha — have helped advance marriage equality around the world, from the United States to Nepal .

“What they have done is offer hope for other couples to have their marriages recognized,” said Mateo Rodrigo, a lawyer with Igual Bolivia, the LGBTQ+ legal advocacy group that represented the couple. “We believe change is inevitable.”

Their battle began nearly four years ago, when authorities denied the women a marriage license and they turned to the courts.

Justiniano, a psychologist, and Rocha, a neuroscientist, fell in love after meeting through mutual friends in Santa Cruz in early 2022. Soon, they were talking marriage. No same-sex couple had ever married in Bolivia, but a traditional marriage was what they both wanted.

“We wanted to fight for marriage because it had always been part of our life plan,” said Rocha, a Bolivian-American born in Hollywood, Florida, who grew up between both countries.

By then, some gay and lesbian couples in Bolivia were seeking to formalize their relationships through “uniones libres,” or “free unions,” a legal status for partners who live together without marrying. In theory, such unions carry the same legal and financial rights as marriage. But in practice, when same-sex couples try to exercise those rights, they tend to face discrimination and end up mired in bureaucracy, lawyers say.

Justiniano and Rocha wanted the greater social recognition and security enjoyed by married heterosexual couples — and, particularly for Rocha, confidence that their relationship would be recognized if they moved to the U.S.

When they applied for a marriage license in Santa Cruz, they were rebuffed, as expected.

But their lawyers found an opening in Bolivia’s constitution, which states that international treaties, especially those dealing with human rights, supersede national law.

They cited an advisory opinion from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, arguing that states should offer same-sex couples all legal protections afforded to heterosexual couples, including marriage rights.

“We expected a difficult process, but honestly, we never imagined it would take this long,” Justiniano said, holding Rocha’s hand as they recalled years of shuttling between government offices and courthouses, chasing down obscure paperwork and parsing contradictory instructions. For months at a time, the process stopped cold.

“There were so many obstacles. There was so much discrimination,” she said.

On March 13, more than three years and two lawsuits later, a constitutional tribunal in La Paz, the administrative capital, sided with the couple, finding that the civil registry had discriminated against them.

Rocha emerged stunned from the six-hour hearing. “She called me right away. Her voice was trembling and she told me, ‘If I understand what just happened, I think we did it,’” Justiniano said. “I was like, ‘So, can we get married tomorrow?’”

The tribunal ordered authorities to issue their marriage licenses within 10 days. It took another five months.

Their marriage, now legally recognized throughout Bolivia, could lead other same-sex couples to follow, officials say.

“This is an important precedent because, just as these two women in Santa Cruz were able to formalize their marriage, there will surely be other couples who come forward seeking the same recognition,” said Paola Tapia, a senior official at Bolivia’s Ombudsman’s Office, an independent government entity tasked with protecting human rights in the country.

Already, other same-sex couples have approached Igual Bolivia about getting married, the advocacy group said.

Because their lawsuit concerned a violation of constitutional rights, the case now heads to Bolivia’s Constitutional Court for review. Justiniano and Rocha’s marriage will stand no matter how the court rules, but if the country’s highest court ratifies the lower court’s ruling, it would bolster the legal basis for other same-sex couples seeking to marry and bring Bolivia in line with its more progressive neighbors, Tapia said.

Cooking fettuccine in their kitchen a week after their wedding, Justiniano and Rocha reflected on what it meant to be the first same-sex couple to officially marry in this nation of 12 million.

“This process may have begun about us, but in the end, it's about rights," Rocha said. "It's about people protecting their love.”

DeBre reported from Buenos Aires, Argentina.