Originally Posted by
jphripjah
OK, let's talk statistics. According to this Wikipedia article based on data from the Australian bureau of statistics, the population of Australia is estimated to be 23,969,900 in January 2016.
Many residents of Australia were born in other countries. But if you scroll down to the country of birth section, a large chunk of those foreigners come from the UK, New Zealand, or Western Europe.
Pakistan, the 6th most populous country in the world, doesn't even place in the top 30 countries of birth for Australians.
Of those 23,969,900 Australian residents, only 49,770 were born in Pakistan. That means that 99.8% of Australian residents weren't born in Pakistan. Only two out of every thousand Australian residents were born in Pakistan. I expect the numbers for Australian citizens are probably similar.
My point is that it's quite rare for a person who hands an Australian passport to a CBP officer to have been born and raised in Pakistan. I have no problem with them taking an hour or more to confirm the Australian citizenship of this couple.
Rare or not, a valid passport is most commonly prima facie evidence of citizenship of the person pictured in it -- regardless of place of birth.
Demographic trends involving immigration patterns cause changes over time, sometimes slowly. [Keep in mind that during still living history Australia even had a very racist immigration policy.] But that place of birth history ought not to matter as a valid passport is most commonly prima facie evidence of citizenship of the person pictured in it -- regardless of place of birth.
There are many millions of people who qualify for citizenship and passports of countries in which they've never even stepped foot. Example:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...s-legally.html