I do not understand why there are loopholes. This makes no sense and should have not existed in the first place. If we as a country aren’t going to allow people who are adopted full citizenship, we shouldn’t allow adoption from outside the US. We either accept the responsibility fully, or we stop the process from occurring ever.

How UNCHRISTIAN IS THIS LOOPHOLE. Why would we throw out people who have been adopted & been a part of a family & country their whole lives, THEY ARE AMERICANS. THE SAME WITH DACA PEOPLE. RHEY KNOW NO OTHER COUNTRY. THEY ARE AMERICANS. Only heartless people would want to make them afraid & anxious about staying in the only country they know.

“Family Values”...Republican Party where are you when it counts? Hypocrites?!

From what I understand, this is not about adoption of adults, but of adoption of children who happened to be adults at the time this law which granted them citizenship was enacted. Of course all children who are adopted by US citizens should be able to be citizens. Whole premise of adoption is that adoptees are now your children. Why is this even a question?

Adoptees of US citizens should have the same rights to citizenship as natural-born children of US citizens. Please vote yes to make it so.

These individuals were legally adopted and that makes them citizens.

To all who voted on this earlier this afternoon. Countable corrected a mistake in the original "What is it?" Section that stated the children were 18 at the time of adoption. All should look at the act again and re cast their vote based on the correct information.

This loophole makes no sense. Close it.

I think there is some confusion on what the law did when initially implemented. It is not necessarily that someone was adopted when they were over 18, that is very rare, but rather someone adopted as a baby or child younger than 18 at the time of adoption, but that was now over 18 when the law was implemented was excluded from being allowed citizenship automatically. There is no reason to believe these 35000 adoptees should not be allowed in my opinion. Many of them grew up in their adopted families the majority of their lives.

Vote yes

The countable summary is confusing people. It was written incorrectly. Please update. This applies to those adopted as children who were adults when the law first passed so they got left out.

How do people not understand that NOBODY IS ADOPTING AN ADULT?!?! Children are not being adopted internationally over age 18!! The issue is for those who were adopted AS YOUNG CHILDREN who were not granted citizenship when they were adopted. The purpose of this legislation is to make sure that international adoptees don't risk deportation as adults simply because they were adopted before legislation (Child Citizenship Act) was enacted which now makes such children citizens at the time of adoption. These are all people who entered the country legally, as children being adopted by American citizens, following every one of the multitude of steps to receive visas from USCIS. There should be NO QUESTION that these people deserve unrestricted citizenship as though they had been born overseas to American parents.

I’m leaning to yea on this, my cousin was adopted from South Korea and was legally adopted by my aunt and uncle in the early 1990’s and I feel for them for their ignorant parents who didn’t do it the right way the first time. Granted they never left the country and never traveled to questionable country than I’m okay with this.

It seems as though many commenters are not understanding this loophole. Allow me to explain my understanding. So, in my opinion, internationally adopted kids who aged into adulthood before the Act went into effect in 2000 should absolutely have citizenship. They were legally adopted as children under the age of 18. Say for example a couple adopted a 9 year old child internationally in 1990. In 1999 they would have turned 18 and by 2000, 20 years old. The Act granted citizenship to international children adopted AFTER it was enacted. This means that the aforementioned 20 year old kid, raised in the United States by American parents for 10 years, is not granted citizenship through the Act and still has to go through the slow and painful process of receiving citizenship. I believe that is unfair and unjustified. Many people saying this is a trick to adopt and grant citizenship to international adults as a way to circumvent the process are mistaken. The Act is already in place, children under 18 are being adopted and granted citizenship. This loophole is about children under 18 adopted BEFORE the Act in 2000, who aged 18+ and were considered adults at the time it was put in place. So these kids, who are now adults, still have to go through the citizenship process even though they would technically be citizens already if they had been adopted after the act. It’s unfair to them and I believe they should be granted citizenship as well.