New USCIS Policy Regarding Citizenship for Foreign Born Children to US Citizen Parents

A new U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services policy could make it more difficult for certain children born abroad to parents serving in the military or in the government to qualify for U.S. citizenship. This new guidance will take effect on Oct. 29, 2019 and would mean that children born and living abroad whose parents are in the military or are government employees are no longer considered “residing in the United States” for the purposes of automatically acquiring U.S. citizenship under an Immigration and Nationality Act provision called Section 320. Instead, American parents must apply for citizenship for their foreign-born kids under a different section of the INA that also requires parents to have spent five years living in the U.S. — two of which must be after age 14 — to pass their citizenship to their kids. For details about the guidance, see https://www.uscis.gov/news/fact-sheets/uscis-policy-manual-update