I don't think there is any name validation performed.

I have not done this for a while now but the system used to be that if there is no ETAS required then there is no problem but if required then the system itself will not board you. The agent would not be able to board you. They have to refer to their supervisor who has a contact number to clear it up. Could take a few minutes to do it. Some airlines have 3rd party approved by Homeland Security to do this.

I'm a dual US-FR citizen, living in the US. When I go to Europe (France or anywhere else in the EU), I always have my US passport attached to the PNR because that's the most important of the two (can't return without it, and attached to Global Entry profile). I have never bothered trying to attach the EU passport on the outbound leg and the US passport on the return leg. I show my US passport to the airline on both ends, and only show my FR passport at the EU border control (both in and out).

Questions:

1. Nobody at the EU border has ever complained that my EU passport didn't show up on the reservation, automated kiosks or human agents. Is it because:
   1. the airlines don't transfer the inbound traveler info, or
   2. I am fully entitled to entry as a FR citizen regardless of paperwork lining up, so they don't care
2. Would it be different if I went to a non-EU country where I am not entitled to unconditional entry, perhaps one where US citizens have to pay a fee on arrival but FR citizens don't? For example, El Salvador.

In other words, are there any border controls where it matter that the passport on the PNR match what you present at the border?

Please let's not speculate here about any issues that dual US/EU citizens may experience traveling to or from Europe once ETIAS is implemented.

Let's wait until the rules and regulations are in effect and discuss actual members' experiences and solutions.

In the meantime, if you wish to debate or speculate how ETIAS may affect dual citizens, please do so in the following thread in the Checkpoints and Borders Policy Debate forum:TWA884
Travel Safety/Security co-moderator

Why do you carry the bulky French passport instead of a French national ID card? The ID card gets you into Schengen without having to show a French or US passport.

We could use the perspectives of US-AU/NZ dual citizens as AU and NZ have had ETA programs for a while without major incident as far as I know whether it's departing the US or not.

If I may add a couple of anecdotal experiences, many of my friends are US-born Saudis and many have different spellings on their names in both passports. They've all been coming and going using both passports for years and years regardless of how the name on their ticket is spelled and they don't typically purchase two one-way tickets. They always get regular round-trip tickets and even when going through Saudi entry or exit immigration, or entering the US, the difference in spelling between the boarding pass and passport has never been an issue whatsoever. I don't know how it works on the airline side in this case, but given the experiences I've accumulated, it seems that airlines have a known mechanism to not add a dual citizen's info to APIS once they show a US passport regardless of the name or the spelling. I even know people who literally have different names altogether in both passports and this still hasn't been an issue when traveling to and from the US.

Last Christmas, I traveled using both my Saudi and US passports for the first time ever, and of course Saudi passports require a visa for the US. My name is exactly the same in both passports (Saudi doesn't officially allow dual citizenship if naturalized unless a person is privileged enough to get approval for it from the ministry of interior, or else it's perfectly legal if they're born dual citizens whether it's through a non-Saudi mother or in a place that grants birthright citizenship, though they don't scrutinize things if someone is naturalized unless something else pops up and they don't check for visas or anything when leaving Saudi, but just in case I kept my name as is in both passports to make things easier).

When I checked into my flight to BAH with a layover in LHR (flying to BAH is the same as flying into or out of any Saudi or GCC airport), at DEN I only showed the airline my Saudi passport, and I used my Saudi passport at TSA. Used it all the way until BAH. When I came back, I checked in with the airlines using my US passport and then went through Bahraini exit immigration with my Saudi passport, after that used my US passport at LHR and then all the way to DEN. There was no issue at all with record-keeping just because I never used my US passport anywhere when I flew DEN-LHR-BAH, and I'm a member of NEXUS so I was able to use the GE kiosk just fine, and this is with having a passport that outright requires a visa, not even some sort of ETA.

I don't imagine this will be an issue at all for US-EU dual nationals, just like it hasn't been for US-AU/NZ citizens, and there might be some growing pains to start, perhaps more so for those who have EU residence permits, but I don't think a huge alarm needs to be sounded over it, even if there are some issues at the beginning. One of the abandoned plans was to do a six-month trial run for ETIAS in 2022 (then it was slated in 2023) so it wouldn't surprised me if they still opt for that whenever the hell it's implemented. It'll be prudent to also keep an eye on the UK ETA and any issues arising from that (if any) as it seems like it'll begin before ETIAS, and I'm sure it'll be set up in a way that accommodates US-UK dual citizens or US/ETA citizens with ILR.

Additional evidence that 22 CFR 53.2 (unlawful for US citizen to enter/exit US without a valid US passport) is effecitvely neutered.

Note the "soft" word "expectation" being used instead of stronger language such as unlawful or must. And they only "expect" you to use US passport returnnig to US.

ESTA FAQ
https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov/faq?lang=en...application%3F

A number of reddit post indicating ESTA still gets approved despite listing US passport as additional citizenship.

It looks like the US government is as confused as the rest of us. The State Department states., U.S. nationals, including U.S. dual nationals, must use a U.S. passport to enter and leave the United States. U.S. dual nationals may also be required by the country of their foreign nationality to use that country’s passport to enter and leave that country.

That's actually a terrible example, as AU/NZ both have rules requiring entry on their respective passports, and not permitting the grant of an ETA (or NZeTA) to citizens.

As a dual citizen of AU and NZ, cross country travel is a gigantic pain - have to have passports of both countries, and show both passports at both ends, because neither country can grant a visa to a citizen, but both countries must still validate right of entry. Sometimes you can wing it, sometimes it all falls apart.


It may very well be an issue. Not necessarily an insurmountable one but still.

I meant US citizens who are dual citizens of either Australia or New Zealand, not duals of AU/NZ.

Why would this be an issue?

Heading to US check in with US passport . Heading to EU check in with EU passport.

I believe this has been covered several times already.

Your anecdotal scenarios included precisely zero examples meeting that situation. The reality is, without pre-planning, dealing with either country's entry requirements can be an exercise in frustration unless you prepare. The prevalence of real-time entry eligibility checking at the gate-bridge has moved the importance of understanding what you need to do.

If you're traveling to Australia for example, your eligibility is determined when your passport is scanned at boarding. You scan a US passport on departure from SFO for example when you have AU citizenship, it will flag "DO NOT BOARD" because the Department of Home Affairs systems will say that individual has no ETA, and if that individual tried to apply for one, it would be refused (due to being ineligible as a citizen) while if you scanned another passport, the I-94 records will be way out of whack and cause issues for re-entry, since the US uses APIS as a primary source of exit data.

Some countries (cough, the US) use check-in/APIS data in lieu of exit immigration. Your departure is as important as your arrival. There's a reason that ICAO has a working group sorting this. Because right now it's a mess that unfairly stings travellers. Especially dual-citizen ones.

How does this actually translate to be a problem for passenger?

That is the part that people keep bringing up here as a concern but have not quite really articulated what is the actual problem.

As far as experiences I've known in person and ones I've read online even, I've never seen any problems entering the US for anyone who's a dual citizen even if they left the US without presenting their US passport at any point (like my own experience mere months ago) but apparently this doesn't compute for a great many people.
There's one Reddit thread where I've bickered with someone who keeps advocating for using ESTA on one's EU passport to get to the US if someone can't use their US passport. And when I told him it's a terrible idea because this could subject them to scrutiny at the US border and be referred to secondary and kept there for hours, they insisted I put forth citations, which I couldn't because I don't recall the exact places I've read about the experiences. That person declared themselves "right" because of this . They also linked to several Reddit threads that alarmed me because almost everyone in those threads were encouraging taking this step with only one person warning against it but not giving sufficient details. I told the person to try doing that and report back to us.
So there's an alarming streak of people being paranoid about something that needs no paranoia AND a refusal to take common sense advice and common experiences as valid.
I've no clue why there's such a pushback. The airlines transmit APIS info to the US that the dual citizen is a US citizen even if the name on their boarding pass is different and this has been the experience for many people over and over without failure. It's as simple as that and it will be the same with ETIAS and ETA (UK).

The difference between carrying one or two passports is completely negligible, and I don't think the kiosks take national ID cards. I will try that on a human agent when I go to PPT next week... although that isn't Schengen, technically.