It seems to me that Kamala Harris probably has both Jamaican and US citizenship. Not questioning her US citizenship or eligibility to be President of the US, I am just asking, as an interesting academic matter about a public figure, whether she has Jamaican citizenship. This is the reasoning:
Kamala Harris's father, Donald Harris, was born in Jamaica in 1938. According to the constitution of Jamaica, someone born in Jamaica before independence in 1962 automatically became a Jamaican citizen upon independence. Section 3B(1)(a) of the current revision of the constitution of Jamaica says:
- Every person born in Jamaica shall become a citizen of Jamaica-
a. on the sixth day of August, 1962, in the case of a person born before that date;
(This text has been amended. The original 1962 constitution text, section 3(1) (on page 1693 of this book), is similar:
(1) Every person who, having been born in the former Colony of Jamaica, is on the fifth day of August 1962 a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies shall become a citizen of Jamaica on the sixth day of August 1962.
According to British law, someone born in a British colony, like Jamaica, would have automatically become a British subject at birth, and would have automatically become a Citizen of the UK and Colonies in 1949, so this would have applied to Donald Harris.)
Kamala Harris was born in the US in 1964. According to constitution of Jamaica, a child born abroad to a father who was a Jamaican citizen otherwise than by descent is automatically a Jamaican citizen at birth. Section 3C(b) of the current revision of the constitution of Jamaica says:
Every person born outside Jamaica shall become a citizen of Jamaica-
b. on the date of his birth, in the case of a person born on or after the sixth day of August, 1962,
if, at that date, his father or mother is a citizen of Jamaica by birth, descent or registration by virtue of marriage to a citizen of Jamaica.
(This text has been amended. The original 1962 constitution text, section 6 (on page 1694 of this book), is similar:
- A person born outside Jamaica after the fifth day of August 1962 shall become a citizen of Jamaica at the date of his birth if at that date his father is a citizen of Jamaica otherwise than by virtue of this section or subsection (2) of section 3 of this Constitution.
Originally, Jamaican citizenship by descent could only be passed from the father, not the mother, and only if the father was a citizen otherwise than by descent; this doesn't make a difference for the purposes of this question, since Kamala's father was a Jamaican citizen by virtue of having been born in Jamaica.)
Here, the citizenship by descent is automatic and involuntary. The text says "shall become", not "has the option to become" or "can apply to become". The text does not require any application, registration, choice, claim, or other action for a child to be a Jamaican citizen by descent.
Section 8(2) of the original 1962 text provided that the Governor-General could issue an order to revoke the Jamaican citizenship of anyone exercising the rights of a foreign citizenship:
(2) If the Governor-General is satisfied that any citizen of Jamaica has at any time after the fifth day of August 1962 voluntarily claimed and exercised in a country other than Jamaica any rights available to him under the law of that country, being rights accorded exclusively to its citizens, the Governor-General may by order deprive that person of his citizenship.
This provision has since been repealed and is no longer present in the current revision of the constitution. In any case, I am not aware of the Jamaican government ever having made such an order prior to the repeal of this provision, nor do I think it is likely for them to have ever done so.
It is also possible that Kamala Harris renounced Jamaican citizenship, but I am not aware of her having done so.
So given the above, is it correct to conclude that Kamala Harris currently has Jamaican citizenship (in addition to her US citizenship for having been born in the US)?
Again, I am not questioning Kamala's Harris's US citizenship, her status as a natural-born US citizen, or her legal eligibility to be President of the US. I understand that there is no legal prohibition against dual citizens being President of the US, although it might become a political issue (e.g. Ted Cruz renounced his Canadian citizenship in 2014 prior to his campaign for the Republican nomination for President, though he didn't have to).
