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A long-serving doctor and North Virginia resident, Siavash Sobhani, lost his citizenship at America at the age of 61.
Sobhani, in a statement to the Washington Post, said that after his application for a new passport, the US State Department in February, said in a letter that he should not be a citizen by birth because his father was a diplomat at the Iranian Embassy.
Also contained in the letter is the rule that there is no automatic citizenship for children born to parents benefiting from diplomatic immunity in the United States. It indicated that he only benefited from the immunity without acquiring citizenship.
The doctor who specializes in internal medicine said,
“This was a shock to me. I’m a doctor. I’ve been here all my life. I’ve paid my taxes. I’ve voted for presidents. I’ve served my community in Northern Virginia. During covid, I was at work, putting myself at risk, putting my family at risk. So when you’re told after 61 years, ‘Oh there was a mistake, you’re no longer a U.S. citizen,’ it’s really, really shocking.”
He finds it strange to experience such an issue since his citizenship had always been verified for over thirty years of practicing medicine.
Siavash Sobhani, who turned 62 recently, had begun to consider retiring with the intention to travel the world for a year with his spouse and search for a new apartment.
The congressman for Virginia’s 11th district, Gerald Edward Connolly, intervenes by sending a letter to the US Citizenship and Immigration Services on the physician’s behalf subsequent to Sobhani’s call for help.
In the letter, Connolly wrote,
“I trust that you can imagine how difficult it must be to believe that you were a citizen of the U.S. your entire life, just to find out you actually were not. Our office is respectfully requesting all possible consideration in expediting this case in accordance with U.S. laws and regulations.”
Siavash Sobhani’s future remains uncertain as he awaits the verdict of the United States on his case.
