I think the whole thing that is confusing is the article is somewhat skewed.

The facts, as I believe I've seen both here and with friends who have gone through this, are that if someone marries a USC but came here uninspected (like border crossing, no visa) they MUST return to mexico in order to adjust.

They then have to file for an extreme hardship waiver to ban their spouse for the standard 10 years. Which was this guys case unfortunately.