- Target would sharply expand modern denaturalisation efforts.
- USCIS to prioritise unlawfully obtained US citizenship.
- About 26 million Americans are naturalised citizens.
WASHINGTON: The Trump administration intends to increase its efforts to strip some naturalised Americans of their US citizenship, the New York Times reported on Wednesday, citing internal guidance.
The US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) guidance, which was issued on Tuesday, asks its field offices to “supply Office of Immigration Litigation with 100-200 denaturalisation cases per month” in the upcoming 2026 fiscal year, according to the newspaper.
That would mark a dramatic increase in denaturalisation cases, which, according to the Immigrant Legal Resource Centre, stood at about 11 per year between 1990 and 2017.
Under US law, a person can be denaturalised for several reasons, including illegally gaining US citizenship and misrepresenting a material fact during the naturalisation process.
But the Trump administration has shown a zeal for using every tool at its disposal to target legal and illegal immigrants, leading activists to warn that such a campaign could sweep up people who had made honest mistakes on their citizenship paperwork and sow fear among law-abiding Americans.
The timeline for denaturalisation cases varies, but they can take years to resolve.
A USCIS spokesperson said it was not a secret that the agency’s “war on fraud” prioritised people who unlawfully obtained US citizenship, particularly under the previous administration.
“We will pursue denaturalisation proceedings for those individuals lying or misrepresenting themselves during the naturalisation process,” the spokesperson said.
The guidance comes as Trump has spent much of this year closing loopholes in the immigration system and throwing up roadblocks for people seeking to enter and stay in the country.
US President Donald Trump has carried out an aggressive immigration agenda, including imposing travel bans and an attempt to end birthright citizenship since January.
His administration most recently paused immigration applications, including green card and US citizenship processing, filed by immigrants from 19 non-European countries.
The Justice Department previously also said it would make denaturalisation a priority this year. In a memo distributed in the summer, officials laid out their approach, saying they would target individuals in an array of categories beyond committing fraud in obtaining citizenship.
Categories of eligible people include gang members, those who committed financial fraud, individuals connected to drug cartels and violent criminals, according to the department.
There are about 26 million naturalised Americans in the country, according to the Census Bureau. More than 800,000 new citizens were sworn in last year, most of whom were born in Mexico, India, the Philippines, the Dominican Republic or Vietnam, USCIS statistics show.
Most people stripped of their citizenship revert to being legal permanent residents.
Experts said that despite the ramp-up in referrals, the process to actually denaturalise someone would likely remain quite difficult, raising questions on whether the government will actually be able to get many cases through.
