DOJ Asks Courts to Strip 17 Criminals of US Citizenship

The Department of Justice (DOJ) on June 8 announced that it has asked courts across the country to strip more than a dozen people who have pleaded guilty or been convicted of crimes of their U.S. citizenship.

Filings in federal court requested judges revoke the naturalization of 17 individuals, including Jean Claude Alfred, a 68-year-old Haitian native who became a U.S. citizen in 1994.

Federal officials said Alfred, who does not have a lawyer listed on the court docket, was convicted in 1996 of attempting sexual battery and indecent assault on his daughter, for conduct that began three years prior.

“[Alfred] concealed his crime throughout the naturalization process,” DOJ lawyers told the federal court in Miami.

Another man, 39-year-old Armando Mendoza of Mexico, received sexually explicit images of minors as early as 2009 and pleaded guilty in 2013. Mendoza failed to disclose the crime in his 2011 citizenship application and interview, which means that his citizenship should be revoked, officials said in a separate filing in federal court in California.

Mendoza has not hired an attorney, according to the court docket.

Other people targeted by the DOJ have pleaded guilty or been convicted of crimes, including wire fraud, child sexual abuse, and visa fraud.

“When criminal aliens exploit the naturalization process by breaking the law, there are consequences,” acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement. “Criminal aliens are lying about their past crimes, including drug dealers, sexual predators, and fraudsters.”

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said that “American citizenship is a privilege, and it must be earned honestly.”

“If you come here, break our laws, and lie in your immigration proceedings, you forfeit that privilege,” he said.

Naturalization refers to noncitizens acquiring U.S. citizenship.

Naturalization can be revoked for several reasons, per the Immigration and Nationality Act, such as illegally procuring or having procured naturalization “by concealment of a material fact or by willful misrepresentation.” The proceedings are always brought in federal court. Judges who find that a person knowingly procured naturalization in violation of the law shall revoke citizenship, according to 8 U.S. Code, Section 1451.

The DOJ in May filed denaturalization actions against 12 people accused of offenses such as supporting a terrorist group and sexually abusing a minor.

Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, wrote on X that “the expansion of denaturalization remains very small in scale.

“17 people is a significant increase from historical efforts, true, but represents around 0.00006% of the total naturalized population,” he said. “Stripping someone of citizenship is hard to do for a good reason.”