In-vitro = no citizenship?

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In-vitro = no citizenship?

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Contributor: Petite Valentine Petite Valentine
The Today show had an interesting segment (which has been posted on MSNBC) about a pair of twins born to an American mother who are being denied US citizenship because the citizenship of the donor sperm and donor egg cannot be established.

According to the report:

"Children adopted by U.S. citizens or born to foreign citizens in the U.S. are granted status as Americans. However...children born to Americans overseas through in-vitro fertilization are denied American citizenship unless a donor can be proved to be a U.S. citizen. The laws were created to prevent people from fraudulently attaining status as Americans."

This surprises me to say the least. She carried the twins for nine months, and gave birth to them — does it really matter where the sperm and egg came from?
04/17/2012
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Contributor: Badass Badass
This is insane.
It shouldn't matter where the mommy and daddy are from if the babies were born here.
04/17/2012
Contributor: Petite Valentine Petite Valentine
Quote:
Originally posted by Badass
This is insane.
It shouldn't matter where the mommy and daddy are from if the babies were born here.
Actually they were born in Israel. However, the American mother physically gave birth.
04/17/2012
Contributor: catsin catsin
Splitting hairs. Oh, the U.S. government so does love to contrive a situation
04/17/2012
Contributor: Ghost Ghost
Quote:
Originally posted by Petite Valentine
The Today show had an interesting segment (which has been posted on MSNBC) about a pair of twins born to an American mother who are being denied US citizenship because the citizenship of the donor sperm and donor egg cannot be ... more
Why does it surprise you, exactly? Nothing surprises me anymore about American policy...
04/17/2012
Contributor: Incendiaire Incendiaire
"The laws were created to prevent people from fraudulently attaining status as Americans."

The person in question is an infant, how exactly does an infant possess the intention to commit fraud? I know all these crazies believe that life begins at conception, but now apparently a sperm and an egg can conspire together to form a child inside the uterus of an American woman, just in order to gain citizenship.

Ridiculous.
04/17/2012
Contributor: deltalima deltalima
Quote:
Originally posted by Petite Valentine
The Today show had an interesting segment (which has been posted on MSNBC) about a pair of twins born to an American mother who are being denied US citizenship because the citizenship of the donor sperm and donor egg cannot be ... more
This is surprising to hear. I don't think it should matter.
04/17/2012
Contributor: Petite Valentine Petite Valentine
Quote:
Originally posted by Ghost
Why does it surprise you, exactly? Nothing surprises me anymore about American policy...
I admit it, I'm surprised that there is a legal exclusion of children conceived via in-vitro. It just seems so arbitrary — MORE arbitrary than what I'm used to from the government. If the government is willing to extend citizenship as part of the adoption process, why wouldn't they extend citizenship for a natural birth by an American citizen? It's ridiculous, even by US Government standards.
04/17/2012
Contributor: NurseKitty NurseKitty
Just because a child is born in the US doesn't automatically make it a US citizen. I am a Canadian who lives and works in the US through a visa, if I was to have a child here in the US it would automatically be a Canadian NOT an American. Citizenship for children is given through the parents, which at this point in time is defined by genetics, so if genetically the child is not yours it is not afforded the same rights.

I wouldn't so much call this "splitting hairs" so much as chalk it up to the fact that US Laws are old and need to be updated to reflect the change that technology has made to the way we define things like "Parenthood" and "Marriage".

Laws move very slowly and now there are going to be more "odd" cases. In vitro has been around for a while now but the popularity of it has really gone through the roof in the last 10 years. This is an odd case because most people go through the invitro process in the US not outside of the country.

Also an odd tidbit I picked up about citizenship laws here in the US. If those babies were given US citizenship and the donors came forward and it could be proven they were the genetic parents. Those parents could have the right to demand US citizenship, through their children
04/17/2012
Contributor: Petite Valentine Petite Valentine
Quote:
Originally posted by NurseKitty
Just because a child is born in the US doesn't automatically make it a US citizen. I am a Canadian who lives and works in the US through a visa, if I was to have a child here in the US it would automatically be a Canadian NOT an American. ... more
"Just because a child is born in the US doesn't automatically make it a US citizen."

Not true. To use your example, your child would be entitled to Canadian citizenship regardless of where you gave birth because YOU are a Canadian citizen, however, if you happened to be in the U.S. or a U.S. territory at the time, then the child would also be entitled to U.S. citizenship. It's this part of U.S. Law that gave rise to the Anchor Baby issue.
04/18/2012
Contributor: Beck Beck
That is ridiculous. I am sure the law will be changing since it is not written to include medical advances like In-virto. They were born to a mother that is an American that is all the should matter.
04/18/2012
Contributor: P'Gell P'Gell
The law may be outdated, but the family was told (and they are keeping their American citizenship, evidently) that if they were to live in the US for six months, the children would be granted citizenship.

I don't quite understand the law about this. However, technology is outpacing the rate at which laws can be made.

But, seeing as the mother is the children's legal parent, who the donors were should not be relevant. The convoluted complications of so many different kinds of fertility treatments are straining at law in many many ways. "Who is the parent?" is not an easy question anymore.
04/18/2012
Contributor: NurseKitty NurseKitty
All I have to say is I am waiting for the first donor to challenge for parenthood based on genetics.
04/18/2012