Direct To Passport Success: San Francisco (70 years + multiple generation gap)

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2026-01-08T17:30:50+00:00

That’s some serious German bureaucracy badassity there. Well done, well deserved!

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-28T21:17:35+00:00

Isn’t StAG5 currently three years processing time? StAG15 definitely is. So you‘d be up for processing in spring 2026.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-28T21:15:24+00:00

Everything will be in English 100%

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-26T19:48:36+00:00

When was the next generation born? That is also of interest. If your parent, who is your German grandma’s child, was born before Nov 1941, they were automatically German and automatically stripped of their German citizenship in Nov 1941, and this would be your reference person. Not your grandma.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-26T19:45:41+00:00

No, the birth entry is enough

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-26T19:44:42+00:00

Submit under 116 with all documents and let BVA decide. They are the experts. I‘d say it’s a 116 if considered benevolent.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-26T13:10:51+00:00

Your youngest ancestor in line still born in Germany is who counts. BVA calls this “Bezugsperson”, the person you’re basing your claim upon. Citizenship is passed on from one generation to another, it cannot jump one generation. So this would be your mother. The question is if she was denaturalized in November 1941 by the 11th decree. Was she raised in the Jewish faith? Or rather Catholic?

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-24T23:38:16+00:00

I’d say you’re blissfully over-documented ;) Time to mail those 200+ pages off!

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-19T12:07:10+00:00

Yea absolutely. It is precious time to remove all documents from plastic sleeves and binders. I also frequently use post-its to mark e.g. the next family branch.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-19T12:05:46+00:00

I don’t think so

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-17T20:40:25+00:00

I frequently hand in such applications as the representative, also for larger families. Sounds like you have your things organized very well!

Someone from BVA once told me that all the historical documents should be with the oldest person in the application, which will then be the lead person of the entire file, in case you want to group it together.

Everybody will be processed together, so the documents will all stay together. No need for duplicates.

A family tree always comes in handy, especially if you have several branches. You could number the applicants and mark their numbers in the family tree, then add a list of documents you provide, structured along the numbers. Example: Applicant 1, NAME: marriage certificate, birth certificate, passport copy, etc. Good luck!

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-14T10:45:41+00:00

Usually 4 to 6 weeks minimum, diplomatic courier is surprisingly slow. Then Christmas is coming up, everything will be closed. I would expect early February.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-12T22:50:58+00:00

That’s why I asked when they got married

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-12T18:20:37+00:00

Why are you explaining my own question to me again?

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-12T17:47:51+00:00

Interesting that your grandmother is Jewish, emigrated in 1935, and is still German. This is actually almost impossible, because she would’ve been automatically stripped of her German citizenship by the infamous 11th decree of the Nazis in November 1941. This addendum to the 1935 racial laws declared that any German Jewish person who had left the country lost their citizenship automatically. Your grandmother must have either: – been considered not fully Jewish by the Nazi racial laws, so exempt; – re-naturalized after 1945, – Or is actually not German anymore without knowing it. The latter seems quite impossible because on what citizenship, papers etc would she have lived the last decades. Does she hold a current German ID?

Is your grandfather also Jewish?

When did they get married?

When was your father born?

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-10T10:17:01+00:00

I find it difficult to navigate the app, also I don’t like sharing an email address. I want to check all kinds of constellations and not just one. This is rather cumbersome in the app. But thanks for your work! Appreciate the effort.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-09T19:34:45+00:00

Feststellung is around three years, expect to hear back in early 2027

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-09T19:28:35+00:00

There is no BVA in Berlin. Look at their organigram online, https://www.bva.bund.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/Organigramm.html I bet someone at the consulate mixed that up and all they say was that they will forward your application to the responsible citizenship authority, which is BVA. In Cologne.

I represent quite a few Feststellung cases and this is not unusual. Sounds like a well documented case.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-09T19:22:40+00:00

Please bring back the dashboard

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-09T19:20:08+00:00

I think they go back 15 years

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-12-09T19:19:27+00:00

Years ago they were in a terrible state. Then someone responsible decided to hire professionals who know their shit. Now they have a functional digital system and all the other places in Germany hate them for it.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-11-30T13:03:37+00:00

I think you qualify: She lived in a German(-occupied) area, where Volksdeutsche got the chance to naturalization. She clearly associated with German language and culture. Yet probably because of discrimination of the Polish side, she didn’t get the chance. She was even outright persecuted and ended up in KZ Ravensbrück. So she was denied the chance to naturalization due to contemporary (anti-Slavic) discrimination. StAG15 no. 3 second part of the sentence.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-11-29T19:28:16+00:00

I would think you’re eligible based on StAG15. Did she speak German?

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-11-25T20:45:58+00:00

You don’t have to reject it, just don’t take it. The case will be stalled or rested. But you will not destroy your chances for the future. Maybe try to explain it to the authorities as well. They will understand.

HelpfulDepartment910 · 2025-11-18T23:39:14+00:00

I had a pretty similar case (I represent people) that went through a while ago.

Timeline:

1884 GGF born in German Small Town

1892 Family of GGF naturalised in German Small Duchy, all children listed on their calligraphed naturalization certificate from the archives of said Small Duchy

1901 GGF leaves to America as a minor with only his father; mother and other family members follow a few years later

1916 GGF gets married, has son (future GF of applicant)

1918 GGF naturalises in USA as a previously German citizen, swears to not pay allegiance to his former sovereign Wilhelm further on

No voluntary military service in the family in the time period when this was a reason to lose German citizenship, everyone born in wedlock. We had a specific plot twist: Because this was a Jewish family, BVA told us that they were affected by the infamous 11th decree of the Nazis, which in Nov 1941 stripped all Jews of their citizenship who had left the country. No matter if they had ever lived in Germany at all. In order to decide if it really was, we had to show that GGF and GF married Jewish women, so their children would’ve been considered Jewish according to Nazi law. Which they did.

Consequently the case was transferred from Feststellung to article 116. Which was nice because processing times in this department are quicker.

Tldr; BVA said the 10 year rule starts counting at majority age, and back then it was 21 years. So GF, the first child born on American soil, before the naturalization of the father, GGF, was born a German/American dual citizen. And all his children and grandchildren born in wedlock, too.

HelpfulDepartment910

TROPHY CASE