N-600 question

K

katie40

New Member
Hello,
I am a German national who became US-citizen just recently, last month, by naturalization. I have a son who is 1.5 years old. I am wondering, does the child has the write to become a US-citizen by filing the N-600 for him or not? I am a little bit confused about this law, I mean does the child have to be born to an already US-citizen to be eligible to file for the N-600 or is it possible for him to become a US-citizen now, after I became a US-citizen?

Thanks in advance.
 
katie40 said:
Hello,
I am a German national who became US-citizen just recently, last month, by naturalization. I have a son who is 1.5 years old. I am wondering, does the child has the write to become a US-citizen by filing the N-600 for him or not? I am a little bit confused about this law, I mean does the child have to be born to an already US-citizen to be eligible to file for the N-600 or is it possible for him to become a US-citizen now, after I became a US-citizen?

Thanks in advance.
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Was your son born in the U.S.? If yes, he is already a U.S. citizen by birth, and his birth certificate is a proof of U.S. citizenship - in that case he does not need to file N-600 (and in fact, he won't be able to file it), and you can just apply for a U.S. passport for him using his U.S. birth certificate.

If he was born outside of the U.S., then he most likely derived U.S. citizenship through you after your naturalization and you can indeed file N-600 for him. In order to derive U.S. citizenship through you, he has to satisfy the provisions of the Child Citizenship Act.
Basically, at some point after your naturalization and before he turns 18 years old he needs to reside in the U.S. with you, in your legal and physical custody, and to have a green card - the moment these conditions are satisfied, he automatically becomes a U.S. citizen. It is not necessary for you to have been a U.S. citizen at the time of his birth in order for him to qualify for derived citizenship. See:
http://travel.state.gov/visa/immigrants/types/types_1312.html
 
Is your son inside the US living with you? Does he have a green card? Was he born in the US?

If your son satisfied the criteria of the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, he would have automatically become a citizen on the day you naturalized. Then it's just a matter of you applying for proof of his US citizenship in the form of a US passport and/or N-600.

N-600 is optional, but it has the advantage in that it doesn't expire, and the lack of N-600 may make it more difficult to replace his passport if it is lost/stolen. However, the N-600 takes 2-6 months to process, whereas the passport is normally issued in less than 1 month. So many or most people will get the passport first then apply for N-600.
 
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