Facts: In January 2014, a citizen of Portugal entered the United States on the Visa Waiver Program and came to the firm because she thought she might be a citizen of the United States.
The Firm’s Representation: Citizenship by operation of law can be very tricky, especially in this case. In this case, our client’s father was a Portuguese national who came to the United States as a child and later naturalized before our client was born. While in Mexico, our client’s father had a child – our client – with a Mexican woman, but they were not married. They eventually got married about 20 years later, in Portugal. Our client was actually born in Mexico, but obtained Portuguese citizenship when she was a teenager. Luckily, that process included documentation from our client’s father that professed financial support and paternity of our client, all of which occurred before our client turned 18 years of age.
Outcome: On December 29, 2014, our client was given a certificate of U.S. citizenship.