Canada pauses processing of some citizenship-by-descent applications, clarifies rules for those under review

Canada's immigration department has temporarily stopped finalizing some new citizenship-by-descent applications, according to reporting by Global News and The Canadian Press.

The pause follows letters sent to a few dozen people who had already been approved, telling them to surrender their citizenship certificates while their files are re-examined.

Get a Free Consultation on Applying for Proof of Canadian Citizenship

In a statement issued late Wednesday and reported by both outlets, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) has commenced an internal review to determine "how this occurred" and is taking steps to ensure applications are assessed fairly and lawfully. The statement itself is not available to the public.

New details on legal permissions for those with surrender letters

The reporting provides more clarity on what citizenship by descent applicants who have been issued a surrender letter, and are caught in the review, can and cannot do.

Per the news outlets, those who received a certificate and have already moved to Canada can still work while the review takes place. They cannot, however, use a Canadian passport while their citizenship claim is under review, and IRCC says it is notifying them of that.

Per Canadian citizenship laws, applicants who have been issued a surrender letter are still considered Canadian citizens while their application is under review.

A citizenship certificate is the document that proves a person's status and lets them apply for a passport. Anyone who received a surrender letter will get a chance to submit more documentary evidence.

If the review confirms Canadian lineage, the certificate is returned to the applicant.

Background on the surrender letters

Earlier this week, CIC News reported that IRCC had asked recent recipients to hand their certificates back for review.

The letters cited a regulation that lets the Registrar of Canadian Citizenship request a certificate back when there's reason to question entitlement, and they pointed to gaps in the documents applicants had filed.

The reaction was sharp. Some applicants and observers argued the government had shifted the documentary standard after the fact, approving files and then questioning the same evidence.

Others raised a constitutional concern: that the forced surrender of a certificate may be unconstitutional, since it suspends a document tied to a person's status before any finding has been made. Those legal questions remain unresolved.

Get a Free Consultation on Applying for Proof of Canadian Citizenship

It is unclear at this time how many people may have been issued a surrender letter.

Following the change to Canada’s citizenship laws, which took effect on December 15, people born before that date can now claim Canadian citizenship without meeting any residency requirement, provided that they can trace and prove a direct lineage, generation by generation, to a Canadian ancestor.

The change triggered a surge in applications, particularly from Americans.

Provincial archives were overwhelmed by requests for old vital records, most of them from Americans tracing Canadian roots. The proof-of-citizenship queue grew, and the wait time has climbed to roughly 15 months, with more than 82,000 applications pending.

Some of these applications will likely experience even greater wait times after the pause in processing discussed above.

What the surrender letters change for new citizenship applicants

The law has not changed. Bill C-3 is in force, and the eligibility rules are the same as they were the day before the pause. What has changed is the level of documentary scrutiny new applicants should expect.

The strongest protection against a review is a file that proves an unbroken line of descent with records from the offices that issued them, rather than transcripts or copies sourced from genealogy websites—Immigration Minister Lena Diab cited both of these documents as lacking evidence across several statements made this week.

Where an original record cannot be located, a written explanation documenting the search effort should accompany the application.

If you want to understand where your own family line stands, you can check your eligibility for citizenship by descent or speak with an immigration lawyer who works under the Bill C-3 framework about building a file that will withstand review on the first submission.

Get a Free Consultation on Applying for Proof of Canadian Citizenship