The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced in June that it would be seeking to revoke the citizenship of a Nevada resident who applied for citizenship under a false identity and failed to disclose that she previously applied for immigration benefits in her 2010 naturalization application.

The case marks the first denaturalization effort in Nevada in over two decades, according to the nonpartisan data organization Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC.) It's part of a wider push from President Donald Trump to expand denaturalization efforts — a rarely seen tactic meant to strip the citizenship of people who lied on their applications or have serious criminal histories. Since the start of Trump's term, a record 123 denaturalization complaints have been filed across every state.   

This summer, the Trump administration's efforts began to play out in Nevada, which has one of the largest foreign-born populations per capita. In September, Nevada First Assistant U.S. Attorney Sigal Chattah sent out a press release that her office was seeking to revoke the citizenship of another naturalized Nevada resident who failed to disclose his history of sexual assault when he applied for citizenship in 2018.  

Alongside that release, Chattah posted on X that her office "will aggressively investigate and prosecute those who use deceit to obtain these sacred rights."

So far, the two cases filed in Nevada line up with the Trump administration's claim that it seeks to target violent criminals, gang members and people who lied on their citizenship applications. Still, some legal scholars and advocates are concerned about the potential for abuse and that the push comes with a "political flavor." 

Those concerns are heightened under Chattah, who as Nevada's U.S. attorney has discretion to initiate denaturalization proceedings. During her tenure as Nevada's top prosecutor, she has worked to carry out Trump's immigration crackdown — launching a probe to prove that noncitizens were widely voting in state elections and invoking a rarely used 18th century wartime law to justify rapid deportations.

Muzaffar Chishti, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan think tank Migration Policy Institute, said that denaturalization is an "extremely integral" part of Trump's immigration agenda and has become increasingly politicized under his administration. 

Key to this is that in 2025 the DOJ gave much wider discretion to U.S. attorneys on whether to pursue denaturalization cases. A June 2025 DOJ memo told U.S. attorneys to make denaturalization a top priority, shifting prosecution of these cases from a specialized unit in Washington, D.C., to U.S attorneys' offices. The memo also expanded the list of crimes which may put an individual at risk of losing their citizenship, including Medicaid fraud or cases referred to the U.S attorney's office "in connection with pending criminal charges."

"The more enthusiastic a U.S. attorney is to appease the president, the more likely it is that they will make denaturalization a priority," Chishti said in an interview. "I would say that by decentralizing it [by giving individual U.S. attorney's offices wider discretion], it has clearly created opportunities for U.S. attorneys to curry favor with the White House."

Nevada's U.S. attorney's office did not respond to questions about whether denaturalization will be a priority, how many denaturalization cases it has pursued or how the office is coordinating with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services on denaturalization efforts. 

In a response to a request for comment, a spokeswoman for the office said that the June complaint against the Nevada resident alleges "numerous misrepresentations and unlawful acts that adversely reflect her moral character."

How is someone denaturalized? 

The process to be denaturalized is legally complicated, requiring that the federal government has "proof beyond a reasonable doubt" that someone violated naturalization fraud laws. 

Those violations include a person obtaining citizenship without meeting the qualifications for naturalization, such as living in the U.S. for a required period of time, or a willful misrepresentation of facts that would have affected their grant of naturalization. A person can also be denaturalized if they gained citizenship through military service but were not honorably discharged or if they are a member of the Communist Party. 

To kick off denaturalization proceedings, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services must first recommend to the DOJ that an individual's status be revoked either on criminal or civil grounds. Following that, prosecutors, such as U.S. attorneys, can then choose to file that complaint in federal court. Such cases can often take years and span several presidential administrations. 

Given how legally complicated it can be, Michael Kagan, executive director of the UNLV Immigration Clinic, said he is not too concerned about naturalized citizens becoming caught up in the administration's denaturalization efforts. Instead, Kagan likened the administration's efforts to "psychological warfare" meant to make naturalized citizens uncertain about their legal status.

"Denaturalization legally is a very narrow procedure used for some very exceptional circumstances," Kagan said. "While there's been an increase in cases nationwide, I would discourage most naturalized citizens from feeling any sense of panic from this."

Kagan noted that the two cases in Nevada were both "colorful" and reflective of the type of cases that were typically pursued under prior administrations. In the first case, the defendant applied for citizenship multiple times under different names and the second case involved a man who had several assault charges which he pled guilty to in 2024. Given that the cases were recently filed, Kagan noted it's not clear if those facts are contested by the defendants. 

Another issue that Kagan brought up is that defendants in civil cases, such as the woman in the June case, are not entitled to appointed attorneys if they cannot afford them. Civil cases also do not have a statute of limitations, meaning that a complaint can be filed decades after the alleged crime. This could have huge implications for defendants: In the case involving the Nevada woman who applied under a false name, it could also affect the citizenship of her child, for whom she also filed a petition. 

 "I think they want to make naturalized citizens feel unwelcome and uneasy and insecure," Kagan said. "The point of citizenship is sacred, and you should not have to feel anxious about your citizenship."