I’m looking for similar information—

I’m eligible for dual American and Dominican citizenship, which I can claim at any time though I am only an American citizen at the moment. I would like to claim Dominican citizenship so that I can go about claiming the two year naturalization citizenship Spain offers. I’ve been offered a spot at a university for graduate school, which would mean I could complete my graduate studies while living in Spain for the two years, assuming that it’s okay to use a student visa to become a naturalized citizen. Does anyone know any further details about this, or how I would go about claiming naturalized citizenship (any rules in regards to visas I may or may not be allowed to have while living there for the two years, etc)? I know that the UK has specific rules about people claiming naturalization—more specifically rules against using student visas to do so—so I just want to make sure that I would go about this properly.

I want to add my question to this topic because it’s similar.

I am interested in if I can get Spanish Citizenship.

I am a native-born US citizen.

My mother was born in Spain, but moved to the US when she was very young and is a naturalized US citizen.  She doesn’t have active Spanish citizenship and didn’t when I was born. I am not sure if her father ever had Spanish citizenship (she never asked) but her mother had citizenship by birth.

From what I can gather she can claim her citizenship anytime she wants to. But can I claim citizenship through her?

I know that I can through my grandparents but from what I read that requires a year of residence and lots more paperwork.
(Is that right? And if not what does it require?)

I am also under 20. So can I claim Citizenship by option?

I have lots of family that still lives in Spain if that makes any difference. (Vouch for me or the like.)

Thanks for any help in advance!

My mother was born in Spain, but moved to the US when she was very young and is a naturalized US citizen.  She doesn’t have active Spanish citizenship and didn’t when I was born. I am not sure if her father ever had Spanish citizenship (she never asked) but her mother had citizenship by birth.

try to get her spanish birth certificate and go to the spanish consulate in your area and verify if she ever renounced her citizenship

From what I can gather she can claim her citizenship anytime she wants to. But can I claim citizenship through her?

if she is still a spanish citizen, her being a native born spaniard makes her ctizenship “de origen” which means she can pass on her citizenship to you automatically. you will be just be registered with a new spanish birth certificate. once done you can get your dni and passport and ss, etc.
consult consulate and get ready and used to unamerican bureaucracy.

Sorry, but I just wanted to clarity your response to me. Thank you for responding.

My mother, as an adult, never formally renounced her citizenship in Spain. When she was 1 1/2 her father moved to the US (her mother died a Spanish citizen) and she was naturalized at age 4.

I wasn’t sure if it was taken from her by, say age 20, since she never moved back to Spain. Wouldn’t simply living in the US be reason to lose active citizenship?
I think I see what you are saying. I know she can’t lose her Right to Spanish Citizenship as long as she lives, but because she never renounced it, has she retained citizenship all that time?

All I can say is that I know for certain that she doesn’t think she ever formally renounced it at a Spanish Consulate or anything like that, and maybe then she still does have it.
I thought at least it might be dormant, or something.

She still has her birth certificate, (it isn’t very useful over here, since no one can read it), but she has the original.

So, I know I can get citizenship by option (I’m not 20 yet), but could I (or my siblings) get de origen?

Thank you so much!

I have a related question:

My father (now deceased) was born in Madrid in 1940 to spanish parents. He immigrated to the U.S. at age 12 and became a naturalized U.S. citizen as a teenager. I have his spanish birth certificate, along with my grandmothers. I may have my grandfathers as well.

I am 50 years old and am interested in gaining spanish citizenship I have been there dozens of times and would like to preserve my spanish heritage and possibly retire there.

Is there any possibility at this stage?

Thanks,

I’m new to this site, so if I bungle the protocols please forgive me.  My husband and I are considering moving to Spain from northern Europe.  I’m American, he’s Dutch.  My last name is Spanish.  I understand that the Law of Historical Memory just expired, but I’m wondering if it would help at all (to get Spanish citizenship) if I can show that I am descended from a Spanish great grandfather who was a Spanish military officer in the Pacific before and during the Spanish American War.  This has to do with “historical memory” that goes back to the 19th century, when my great grandfather and grandfather were both born in the Pacific, in Manila and Guam, respectively - at the end of the Spanish Empire and the beginning of the American Empire. I doubt that I can obtain any official, apostilled documents from that time of war and turmoil (more on that in a minute).  So I wonder if this is too far a stretch for me to claim Spanish citizenship, even though my great grandfather was the military secretary to the Spanish governor of the Mariana Islands, and was the first Spanish officer to be captured as a prisoner of war in the Spanish American War.  My great grandfather’s name is all over civil documents in Guam preceding the American invasion of Guam.  He was even the postmaster in Guam after the Americans took over, as well as an unofficial advisor to the American governor.  There are records of that. 

However, establishing the connection between me and my great grandfather through my grandfather is the problem.  I just learned this week that getting a birth certificate for my grandfather, who was born in Guam in 1890±, is impossible.  In 1944 (the year of my birth), the Americans bombed Guam so thoroughly to get the Japanese to leave that all church records were destroyed, and it was the churches that kept birth and death records.  All my great grandfather’s many children and grandchildren apparently left Guam, probably long before I was born.  My grandfather emigrated to California, where my father was born in 1918.  But I have no official documents related to my grandfather’s existence, and I don’t know where in Southern California he lived or when and where he died.  I only met him when I was a child, and my father is now deceased.

It’s a strange story with a twist at the end: in the 15th and 16th centuries Spain becomes an empire, discovering and settling the Americas, as well as some of the Pacific islands.  Several centuries later, Spain is challenged and defeated by “America” (the United States), and a Spanish family that was sent from Spain to the Pacific ends up in California.  One of the daughters of that family, who grew up in California, recognizes late in life that the American empire is coming to an end, and wants to end her time on Earth in the country of her paternal lineage.  She wants to connect with her Spanish genes after having been dominated by her anglo-saxon lineage most of her life.  She wants to live in Andalusia, where her father’s lineage comes from.  But she can’t prove her connection with her grandfather and father lineage because the country where she was born destroyed the records. 

Does anybody have any ideas about how to bring a happy ending to this story?  I’d be very grateful.  Thank you for listening to this tale.