An Irish woman who has lived legally in the US for four decades has been detained by immigration officials for the last week because of a criminal record dating back almost 20 years.
Cliona Ward, 54, was detained at San Francisco airport on 21 April after returning from Ireland to visit her sick father and is being held at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) facility in Tacoma, Washington.
Ward holds a green card but has convictions for drug possession from 2007 and 2008, which she believed had been expunged, her family said.
You don’t give up an Irish one to get an American one.
Source: Am dual citizen with 2 passports.
You don’t have to but I wouldn’t naturalise in her situation either. Under no circumstances would I pledge allegiance to a country that I felt wasn’t mine and if I had a green card I wouldn’t bother.
That’s not to say I might not feel that way about another country in the future but as I said my sister has been living in the UK for over two thirds of her life and would never consider getting a British passport. Even her adult daughter chooses an Irish one.
If you don’t mind me asking why bother with the dual citizenship? And did you feel any weirdness pledging yourself to the second country?
No pledging required. I hold 2 citizenships by birth.
Edit: Weird to live somewhere for nearly half a century and not “feel” that it’s yours… Why not just go back “home”?
She married an Englishman and raised her kids there because Ireland in 1980 was not exactly thriving. She was around 20 when she left so definitely old enough to feel thoroughly Irish for a lifetime. She still has her accent and all.
She does talk about moving back here occasionally.
I dunno. I’m strongly a “home is where you make it” sort of thing. I couldn’t care less where I was specifically born. But to each their own I suppose.