Map Shows Countries Offering Easy Path to Citizenship for Americans

Newsweek

a day ago

Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
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Interest is growing among Americans who want to leave the United States and find a new home elsewhere, often seeking countries with fast pathways to citizenship, not just legal status.
While President Donald Trump has promised that those able to spend at least $5 million can obtain a pathway to U.S. citizenship through his planned Gold Card visa, other countries, including multiple Caribbean nations, are offering speedy citizenship to those willing to spend a fraction of that amount.
Other countries, particularly some in Europe, offer pathways to citizenship through descent to those whose grandparents or parents were born there, while others, such as the U.S., offer pathways through naturalization or spending a qualifying amount of time in the country.
One of the organizations that helps Americans with such pathways is International Living. Ted Baumann, the organization's chief of global diversification, told Newsweek that there has been a noticeable shift in recent months.
"There are two main groups. The first one, which is actually the smaller group, are those diversifying their wealth outside the U.S. Dollar and outside the U.S. financial system, because they are deeply concerned about its future," Baumann, based in South Africa, said.
"The other group are the people who are appalled by what's happening in the United States. I guess you would call them liberals, in American language, but effectively they are people who have modern sensibilities, they think of the world in globalist terms, they're not stuck on the United States as Number One, and they want to get out."
Upwards of 20 countries offer fast-track citizenship, including several Caribbean nations, but this process can take anywhere from three months to three years, depending on the specific requirements.
Americans may be seeking a second citizenship for various reasons, including dissatisfaction with the current administration, as Baumann has observed a growing number of LGBTQ+ individuals and Jewish people seeking residency outside the U.S.
Others are simply seeking better tax advantages and easier global mobility.
"The world is a big place, there are plenty of places you can be happy, there are plenty of places you can do well financially and protect your wealth," Baumann said.
Younger people are increasingly considering their residency and citizenship options, compared to a few months ago, when it was typically middle-aged or retired individuals who wanted to spend part of the year in the South of France, for example.
Citizenship by Descent
Some European countries offer citizenship to those with ancestors who originated there, such as Portugal, Ireland and Italy. GovAssist, another organization working in the field, explained in a July 7 article that individuals seeking a second passport in these countries would enjoy greater financial and personal freedom, including the ability to travel visa-free.
With a large proportion of Americans having immigrant roots, particularly from European nations many decades ago, Baumann said that several U.S. citizens who have held onto the idea of obtaining a second passport someday in the future are now taking steps to make it happen.
Stock image of a visa for Spain tucked inside a passport.
Stock image of a visa for Spain tucked inside a passport.
Getty Images
"What most people want is the right to live somewhere," Baumann said. "That when they decide to get on a plane and fly abroad, they don't have to come back in 90 days. That's the first thing that people are looking for."
He added that 90 percent of Americans he speaks with simply want a residency that may or may not eventually lead to citizenship. However, more countries are looking to tighten restrictions on who can get a passport, making citizenship a more urgent goal.
Until recently in Italy, Italian Americans who could prove ancestry back to the 1800s could gain citizenship. Now, this is limited to parents and, in some cases, grandparents.
Some of these pathways are not as fast as obtaining citizenship through financial means, but Ireland and Poland can process applications in between six and 18 months in some cases.
Citizenship by Investment or Donation
The other common route to residency or citizenship is through investment or donation, with multiple Caribbean nations offering this pathway with short time frames.
Saint Kitts and Nevis, which has one of the longest-running citizenship-by-investment programs, can process applications in as little as four months, following a minimum investment of at least $250,000.
Elsewhere, the governments of Moldova and North Macedonia don't require investments, but rather donations between $100,000 and $200,000.
For some nations, citizenship by investment has become a lucrative option for governments that do not receive significant income from their citizens.
Baumann said the turmoil in the U.S. economy earlier this year, brought about in part by tariff threats from the White House, caused Americans to consider moving themselves or their assets elsewhere. Despite the recovery in May, tariffs are back on the cards.
"Now it's going this way again and they're just saying: 'I gotta get off this rollercoaster,'" Baumann said. "It's not just people who don't like Trump; it's people who maybe voted for Trump and maybe recognize that one of the costs of supporting Trump is that it might hurt their wealth, and so they're very quietly moving their own wealth outside the United States."
Until recently, International Living received few inquiries about obtaining a Caribbean passport; however, interest has sharply risen in the last few weeks. Not all nations require individuals to reside there.
One caveat is how the rest of the world views such passports, as the European Union does not offer visa-free travel to these nations.
Whichever route Americans looking to emigrate choose to go down, one thing is clear to Baumann, who has noticed time becoming a critical factor for those who want as quick an exit from the U.S. as possible.
"People are freaked out, there's no question about it," Baumann said. "This is not a normal situation."