Thousands of individuals adopted by U.S. families, many decades ago, face potential deportation due to lacking formal U.S. citizenship. These adoptees, who have spent most or all of their lives in the United States, have discovered their undocumented status when attempting to access services or obtain official documents. The issue has prompted concerns among affected individuals and advocacy groups, particularly in the current climate of increased immigration enforcement.
Individual Cases Highlight Citizenship Gaps
Shirley Chung, adopted from South Korea by a U.S. family in 1966 when she was one year old, discovered she lacked U.S. citizenship in 2012. Her birthfather was an American military member, and her birth mother placed her in an orphanage in Seoul. After adoption, she was brought to Texas and lived a life typical of many Americans, including attending school, obtaining a driving license, working, marrying, and raising children. Her lack of citizenship came to light when she needed a replacement Social Security card.
Similarly, a woman adopted from Iran in 1973 at the age of two by an American couple faced a similar discovery. Growing up in the U.S. Midwest, she believed she was a U.S. citizen until she attempted to get a passport at age 38. At that time, she found that critical documents supporting her citizenship claim were missing from immigration records.
Scale of the Issue
Estimates suggest that between 18,000 and 75,000 American adoptees may lack U.S. citizenship. Some of these intercountry adoptees may be unaware of their non-citizen status. The Adoptee Rights Law Center reports that dozens of adoptees have been deported to their birth countries in recent years. In one instance, a man adopted from South Korea was deported due to a criminal record in 2017 and subsequently died by suicide.
Reasons for the lack of citizenship vary, often attributed to adoptive parents not completing the necessary paperwork for their children to obtain legal status or naturalized citizenship.
Legislative Context
For decades, intercountry adoptions approved by courts and government agencies did not automatically confer U.S. citizenship. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 aimed to address this by granting automatic citizenship to international adoptees. However, this law applied only to future adoptees or those born after February 1983, leaving tens of thousands of adoptees who arrived before this cutoff date without citizenship.
Advocacy efforts to remove the age cut-off in congressional bills have not been successful. For example, Debbie Principe, who adopted two children with special needs from Romania in the 1990s, has spent decades seeking citizenship for them. Her most recent citizenship application for one child was rejected in May, followed by a notice requiring an appeal within 30 days or the child would need to be surrendered to Homeland Security.
Current Enforcement Environment
Concerns among adoptees and their families have escalated following President Donald Trump's return to the White House, given his administration's stated commitment to removing individuals deemed to be in violation of federal immigration law. The Trump administration has reported a significant number of individuals leaving or being deported from the United States.
Recent enforcement actions have drawn attention. For instance, 238 Venezuelans were deported to El Salvador and accused of gang affiliation, with reports indicating most had no criminal records. Additionally, U.S. officials detained 475 individuals, over 300 of whom were South Korean nationals, on allegations of illegal employment at a Hyundai facility in Georgia.
Adoptee rights groups, such as the Adoptee Rights Law Center, have reported a notable increase in requests for assistance, with over 275 requests received by attorney Greg Luce. Some adoptees have reportedly taken measures to avoid potential encounters with authorities, such as the Iranian adoptee who avoids certain areas and shares her location with friends.
The Department of Homeland Security did not provide a comment when requested. Shirley Chung, now in her 60s, has publicly appealed for assistance in securing citizenship for herself and other adoptees in similar situations.