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The number of Americans applying for UK citizenship rose to the highest on record last year, with Donald Trump’s return to power and UK tax changes contributing to a surge of applications by US citizens in Britain.
Over 6,100 US citizens applied last year, the most since records began two decades ago and 26 per cent more than in 2023. Overall applications for UK citizenships were up by 6 per cent to 251,000, another record.
Applications by US citizens surged in the last quarter of 2024 in particular, rising 40 per cent year-on-year to about 1,700, according to data published by the Home Office.
Immigration lawyers said Trump’s presidential re-election bid and victory in early November helped drive the increase, along with UK tax changes encouraging Americans to secure British passports before they exit.
Elena Hinchin, partner at law firm Farrer & Co, said the US political landscape was “a very serious driver” of increased interest in UK residency.
“We’ve definitely seen more interest in citizenship from the US since the lead-up to the election campaign,” she said. “There’s much more interest than under the previous Trump administration.”
Hinchin added that the UK’s abolition of non-dom tax status had also encouraged some wealthy Americans living in Britain to seek citizenship before they left.
“Many high-net-worth individuals are considering leaving the UK given the tax changes,” she said. “They want to apply for citizenship now so that they don’t lose the right to do so . . . it just keeps the door open and means more flexibility for their children.”
To apply for UK citizenship, someone has to have lived in the UK for five years or have parents with British citizenship. They may also apply if they are married to a Brit and have lived in the UK for three years.
Home Office data shows that applications by Americans has risen steadily since the end of 2022.
Madeleine Sumption, director of the Migration Observatory at Oxford university, said the data suggested Americans became “particularly keen” to gain citizenship last year, but cautioned that people typically have a range of often personal reasons for seeking citizenship in other countries.
“For people moving from safe countries, politics tends to be a third or fourth order factor, not a key reason for moving on its own,” she said
But Ono Okeregha, director at the law firm Immigration Advice Service, said there was a “huge spike” in British citizenship searches the day after the US election in November, with continued interest in citizenship and visas since the start of Trump’s tumultuous second term.
He added that US applications started to rise a few years ago, reflecting what he called the “aftermath of the first Donald Dash”, as people who emigrated to Britain during Trump’s first term as president from 2016 to 2020 started to become eligible for UK citizenship.
There has also been an increase in Americans seeking citizenship in Ireland, with data revealing a 46 per cent rise in applications last year from people in North America with Irish ancestry.
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