Polk

I assume that the OP was suggesting that another airline would overlook the problem and let the child fly on his UK passport.

LeisureFirst

I'm not surprised. Renouncing one's US citizenship isn't at all easy. I know one friend who did it and she had to undergo a real grilling at the US Embassy. After renunciation, one still gets taxed on worldwide income for ten years, one's name appears on various federal lists of dodgy people, it becomes impossible to live in the U.S. at least for quite some period of time, and I believe it even makes one ineligible for the visa waiver programme as one is categorized as an "excludable" person (alongside, for example, people with certain diseases and many criminals). Furthermore, it has just got even worse with a huge lump sum tax penalty payable upon renunciation - see, for example here.

Lucifer UK

Of course, as a UK citizen (and resident), you can enter your own country without a passport from overseas...

...as I discovered when ours were stolen.

Smirnoff

In which case they presumably re-booked yesterday, checked in without incident and got home last night?

Halo

Failure to renounce ones citizenship has been known to have fatal consequences on occasion.

SchmeckFlyer

I think if a US passport lists a city as place of birth, the assumption is that the city is within the USA, whereas births abroad are listed by country rather than city. At least, my passport states "Germany" as place of birth, but not the city. The same for my Dutch passport (although my identity card does have the city listed, rather than country). Perhaps that is convention for all passports?

Regarding not traveling on the US passport as a US citizen... I think, as others have stated, BA is perfectly correct in their response; it is a fairly well-known rule that US citizens must enter and depart the US using their own passport, at least for FTers, holders of multiple passports and/or expats and those living abroad. It also seems perfectly logical to me to use the respective passport of the port of entry when possible, rather than another one. Why enter as an alien when you are not?

Furthermore, US citizenship is not exactly a bad thing and has huge benefits, especially for travel (besides the tax thing of course, never will understand that). It's not Tanzanian citizenship or some such, in any case. Keeping the passport up-to-date has value IMHO, such as having ready proof of citizenship. Dual US/EU citizenship gives you access to a vast, competitive and advanced labour market, streamlines possibilities for getting jobs overseas, expedites travel (you use citizen lines one both sides of the Pond), gives immediate access to education benefits, and much more... there really is no good reason not to keep the US passport of your children or yourself not up-to-date (you'll have to pay those taxes regardless of whether you have a passport!).

I do make of a point of ensuring no officials ever see I have two passports, so I hide the other one quite well. Avoids sticky questions and prevents either government really knowing...

ajax

My US passport lists the state and the country (USA) as place of birth, no city.

My UK passport only lists the city as place of birth, no state or country.

I quite like that the UK passport only lists the city, as anyone immediately looking at it wouldn't necessarily know I'm a US citizen as well (comes in very handy in certain parts of the world).

I agree with you that a US passport is a wonderful thing to have, all in all. ^

stimpy

But if you fly to the US on your US passport, your US passport is linked to your flight PNR. So you must use the US passport to return to Europe. Generally not a problem.

As for standing in the line at immigration in Europe, you could switch over to your EU passport and probably 99% of the time it would work. But if there is any problem, they will examine things in more detail and perhaps get you in some sort of trouble.

Smirnoff

That's a bit hard, when the UK passport states "New York" as place of birth.

stimpy

French passports state the country and city (and state if US) place of birth. Ditto for French resident cards.

David-A

I'm sorry I didn't let this thread conclude with the OPs second post.

Anway, to conclude what I posted:

Personally I'd never previously heard of any country requiring someone who holds full citizenship elsewhere, but is merely entitled to become a citizen of the country they are wanting visiting to have a passport from that country.

Yes I'd heard of the conscription issues etc around the world, but thought that was a danger on arrival type thing. Never thought of countries requiring advance adoption of citizenship prior to a visit...

But this is something different, and it seems particularly harsh especially considering it concerns children who, IMO, should not be required to take up or exercise anything until they are older.

Now of course they could choose not to visit the USA, however there are plenty of humanitarian reasons why they might want to - visit sick relative etc.

That's why I said it seemed unwelcoming (to potential citizens or otherwise).

ajax

Well I have to agree with you re: "potential" citizens. That does sound a bit harsh. Surely it's up to the parents to register their children (or not) as US citizens. There can very well be a valid reason why they don't want their children to be citizens. But just because they're eligible to be citizens doesn't mean they are, or even want to be.

To be honest, I wasn't even aware of this particular requirement (I knew about actual citizens having to enter on their US passport, of course) before the previous poster pointed it out.

LeisureFirst

What is an example of a "potential US citizen"? Most Americans are citizens without having to do anything to make themselves such. For example, someone born in the United States (with rare exceptions) is automatically a citizen. They don't have to apply, nor do they have any choice in the matter (although they could later go through the renunciation process, although this can be declined by the government).

Well, no. Nor does the UK require "registration" as a citizen.

ajax

Look - I've got no idea. I don't know enough about US citizenship law to know the finer points of who's automatically a citizen and who's not. I know that if you're born in the US, you're a citizen, and if you're born to US citizens (one or both) outside of the US, you might be, but that's it.

I refer you to (a very cryptic, on re-read) post by jahason from whence this discussion arose:

It seems to imply that the children were citizens by default, whether they liked it or not, because their mother is American, but there is a LOT of information lacking in this 40-word post.

Frankly, I don't know what a "potential" citizen is and I don't really care. All I know is that if the US thinks you're a citizen, then you have to enter on its passport.

ANDREWCX

Just as a point of clarification - not everyone born in the US is automatically a US citizen. I know it is a very rare case but children of foreign diplomats in the US don't gain citizenship rights from birth - doesn't apply to any of these cases however I did work with a girl who was born in the US and had lived in the US her whole life (she was 20) but was not a US citizen because her father was some minor functionary in the UK embassy (or UN, can't remember which) and her mother was also not a US citizen. She did have a greencard so she could work a regular job in the US.

So, probably in excess of 99.99% of people born in the US are US citizens at birth but not 100%.

Also, children born to a US parent overseas do have to be registered to be a citizen and then there are other eligibility requirements (the parent has to have lived in the US for a certain amount of time as an adult etc). This is what stops families who emigrate permanently from the US passing on citizenship down multiple generations. I know this from experience - my great grandfather was a US citizen (by a strange quirk of being a 'white' soldier in the Republic of Hawaii army on the day it became a US territory) however, he was actually Australian and spent the remainder of his life (after helping rebuild San Francisco after the great quake) in Australia and South Africa where my grandmother was born. She could have claimed US citizenship but never did (doubt she even knew it was an option) and never lived in the US and neither my mother or Aunt have any claim on it from decent. My Aunt emigrated to the US in the 80's and had to get a greencard etc and then become a naturalized citizen. I emigrated a few years ago and also had to get a greencard (my 5 years is up later this year so will then become a naturalized citizen). By contrast - South African citizenship passes from parent to child indefinitely with no residence requirement (Australia requires a parent to have lived in Australia for several years as an adult to be able to pass on citizenship similar to the US).

And of course just to muddy things up certain areas outside the US are considered to be (or have been at various points) the US for citizenship purposes - the Canal Zone in Panama where John McCain was born is one that springs to mind.