Visa Lawyer Blog
Ninety-five-year-old Leeland Davidson discovered recently that he’s not considered a U.S. citizen, despite living nearly 100 years in the country and serving in the U.S. Navy during WWII.
A similar thing happened to one of our clients that tried to apply for work with the Federal government at the age of 25. He could not get verification for his Citizenship. Eventually his other confessed he was brought over as a 3 year old illegally. But the Vet’s story is even more interesting.
Davidson, from Centralia, Washington, told KOMO News that he discovered he wasn’t a U.S. citizen when he was turned down for an enhanced driver’s license he needed for a trip to Canada to visit relatives.
“We always figured because he was born to U.S. parents he’s automatically a U.S. citizen,” said Davidson’s daughter, Rose Schoolcraft.
Davidson was born in British Columbia in 1916, but his parents didn’t register the birth with the U.S. government to ensure they knew he was a citizen. He checked up on his citizenship before joining the Navy and was told by an inspector at the U.S. Department of Labor Immigration and Naturalization Service he had nothing to worry about. Now he worries that he won’t be able to prove his citizenship, because his parents were born in Iowa before local governments started keeping records of birth certificates in 1880. “I want it squared away before I pass away,” he says.