It’s not only illegal aliens who are escaping enforcement of the nation’s immigration laws.
Under the Obama administration’s expansive interpretation of executive authority, legal immigrants seeking citizenship through the nation’s Naturalization process are now exempt from a key part of the Oath of Allegiance.
Immigrants seeking to become citizens no longer have to pledge to “bear arms on behalf of the United States.” They can opt out of that part of the Oath. Nor do they have to cite any specific religious belief that forbids them to perform military service.
According to the Naturalization Fact Sheet on the US Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) website, In the fiscal year ending June 30, 2015, the nation welcomed 729,995 Legal Permanent Residents into full citizenship.
Over the past decade 6.6 million have been naturalized through a process that ends with the Oath of Allegiance.
In the decade 1980-1990, the average number completing Naturalization was only 220,000 annually, but from 1990 to 2000 that number jumped to over 500,000 annually.
1,050,399 new citizens were welcomed in the year 2008.
18.7 million immigrants are eligible to eventually become citizens, and 8.8 million already meet the 5-year residency requirement.
The pledge to help defend America was good enough for the 6.6 million immigrants naturalized since 2005 and good enough for the over 15 million naturalized since 1980, but Obama’s appointees at the USCIS think that is too much to ask of the 18.7 million estimated legal immigrants eligible today for eventual naturalization or the 750,000 who will be naturalized in the coming year.
“1,050,399 new citizens were welcomed in the year 2008.
18.7 million immigrants are eligible to eventually become citizens, and 8.8 million already meet the 5-year residency requirement.”