Ruling on family reunification visas for skilled workers: The cut-off date of March 1, 2024 is not discriminatory.

For a long time, family reunification for adult children was an absolute exception under German immigration law. With the reform of the skilled worker immigration law, the legislature broke with this principle for the first time in 2024 – but only for a very narrowly defined group of people. Since March 1, 2024, certain newly arrived skilled workers have been allowed to bring their parents to Germany without having to prove exceptional hardship (so-called long-term visa for parents of skilled workers, Section 36 Paragraph 3 of the Residence Act ).

All skilled workers who were already living in Germany before March 1, 2024, remain permanently excluded from the right to family reunification. Since its introduction, this cut-off date has raised significant constitutional concerns regarding the principle of equal treatment (Article 3 of the Basic Law). In a recent ruling, the Berlin Administrative Court nevertheless deemed this unequal treatment " just barely " constitutional. From a legal perspective, however, this decision is unconvincing in key aspects.

Long-term family reunification with adults

According to the fundamental concept of German immigration law, family reunification is primarily limited to the so-called nuclear family . Accordingly, spouses ( spousal reunification ) and minor children ( child reunification ) are primarily protected. Reunification of parents with adult children is explicitly not the norm, even though it is, of course, also protected under Article 6 of the Basic Law. Until the reform of the Skilled Immigration Act, parental reunification with adult children was practically only possible in extreme exceptional cases, namely in cases of so-called exceptional hardship according to Section 36 Paragraph 2 of the Residence Act . This hurdle was deliberately set very high. The legislature wanted to prevent parental reunification with adult children from becoming the norm.

With the amendment to Section 36 Paragraph 3 of the German Residence Act (AufenthG), this has changed for the first time. Since March 1, 2024, certain skilled workers have been permitted to bring their parents to Germany without having to demonstrate exceptional hardship . While the general requirements for granting a residence permit – in particular, securing one's livelihood – remain in place, the structural breakthrough lies in the fact that family reunification is now generally open to this group. The problem, however, lies in the time limitation of this preferential treatment. Only skilled workers who were granted a corresponding residence permit for the first time on or after March 1, 2024 , benefit from the new regulation. Those who were already living in Germany as skilled workers before that date – even for many years – are excluded.

VG Berlin, Date 01.03.2024: Is family reunification unconstitutional?

This rigid boundary has raised significant constitutional concerns from the outset. These concerns were first addressed in a judicial proceeding before the Berlin Administrative Court ( VG Berlin, judgment of April 2, 2025, case no. 28 K 266/23 V ). The plaintiffs were the parents of a skilled worker who had received an EU Blue Card before the cut-off date . The responsible consulate general had rejected the application for family reunification solely on the grounds of the cut-off date.

In the legal proceedings, the parents argued that they were being treated unequally compared to parents of other skilled workers (Article 3 of the Basic Law) . While parents of "new" skilled workers were allowed to join their children, they were denied this right solely due to the date of their initial childcare title. This, they argued, constituted a violation of the principle of equality enshrined in Article 3 of the Basic Law.

The Berlin Administrative Court expressly acknowledged this unequal treatment . It even spoke of a particularly serious differentiation. Nevertheless, the court upheld the regulation as constitutional. Its reasoning was essentially that the legislature pursued a legitimate aim with Section 36 Paragraph 3 of the Residence Act, namely combating the shortage of skilled workers in light of demographic change. Furthermore, the court stated that cut-off date regulations are generally permissible for the legislature, even if they entail certain injustices. The lawsuit was therefore dismissed, although an appeal was granted .

Why the court's argument is unconvincing

From a constitutional perspective, this justification falls short for several reasons. Article 3 of the Basic Law requires that essentially similar situations be treated alike. The relevant comparison group here is the foreign skilled workers and their parents. All these individuals are in a comparable situation . The only difference lies in the date of initial issuance of the residence permit – a criterion over which the individuals concerned had no control. The unequal treatment consists of the fact that skilled workers who entered Germany before March 1, 2024, remain completely excluded from family reunification, while skilled workers who entered later are granted this right. This is therefore a classic case of personal discrimination, for which the Federal Constitutional Court applies particularly stringent requirements.

While it is true that the legislature intended to combat the skilled worker shortage with the family reunification allowance for skilled workers, this is precisely where the administrative court's crucial dogmatic error lies . The equality test does not focus on the justification of the entire regulation, but rather on the justification of the specific unequal treatment – that is, the cut-off date itself. The decisive question, therefore, is not whether family reunification for skilled workers generally counteracts the skilled worker shortage. Rather, the crucial question is whether the exclusion of skilled workers who entered the country before the cut-off date makes any comprehensible contribution to combating this shortage. There is no objective basis for this.

The cut-off date rule even counteracts the shortage of skilled workers.

Reality suggests the opposite. Numerous studies show that the long-term retention of foreign skilled workers depends significantly on their social and familial integration . Those who cannot bring their parents to Germany, even though this is taken for granted by colleagues who arrived later, often perceive this as a massive injustice – with direct consequences for their prospects of remaining in the country.

This renders the cut-off date regulation not only unsuitable for combating the skilled worker shortage, but actually exacerbates the problem , as it can motivate well-integrated skilled workers to emigrate. For the total number of available skilled workers, it makes no difference whether new skilled workers come to Germany or whether skilled workers already living here leave the country. Both affect the skilled worker shortage equally. The Berlin Administrative Court completely ignored this aspect in its decision. It referred only to the skilled worker shortage in abstract terms, without examining whether the specific differentiation between "old" and "new" skilled workers is even appropriate for this purpose. Such an examination, however, would have been absolutely essential.

Political compromise instead of objective justification

Upon closer examination, there is much to suggest that the cut-off date regulation arose less from migration policy logic and more from a political compromise . On the one hand, the aim was to make skilled worker immigration more attractive. On the other hand, family reunification was to be kept as limited as possible in order to avoid opposition to migration policy and to attract only employable foreigners. In legislative discourse, parents are regularly considered economically "not valuable" to the state. Their immigration is therefore seen more as a necessary concession to attract skilled workers – but not as an independent integration policy objective. From a constitutional perspective, such a political compromise is insufficient to justify serious unequal treatment. Article 3 of the Basic Law cannot be suspended merely to secure parliamentary majorities or to serve migration policy symbolism.

Practical significance of the cut-off date rule for skilled workers and family reunification

The practical implications of this regulation are considerable. Tens of thousands of skilled workers have been living in Germany for years, working here, paying taxes, building businesses, and are firmly integrated into society. This very group is permanently excluded from family reunification by the cut-off date – without any individual assessment of their circumstances. This not only leads to personal hardship but also to a structural imbalance in immigration law. Two skilled workers with identical qualifications, identical income, and identical integration are treated completely differently solely based on an arbitrary date. To this day, there is no objectively sound justification for this differentiation.

Conclusion: The constitutional debate is not over.

The ruling by the Berlin Administrative Court represents the first legal challenge to the new regulation, but it is highly unlikely to be the last. Doubts about the constitutionality of the cut-off date remain considerable. The principle of equality demands a significantly more precise justification than the one the court has provided so far. It remains to be seen whether higher courts will intervene to correct this.

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