Newly Stateless Kuwaitis: U.S. Immigration Options

In the spring of 2024, Kuwait’s new Emir, Sheikh Mishal al-Ahmed al-Sabah, suspended the country’s Parliament and parts of the Constitution by decree. By the end of 2024, more than 35,000 Kuwaitis had been stripped of their nationality. By March 2025, the figure had reached 42,000. By August 2025, it was approximately 50,000.

For many of those affected, the loss happened overnight, by administrative committee, with no judicial appeal and no public hearing. The largest single category of those denaturalized — roughly 29,000 people — are foreign-born women who acquired Kuwaiti citizenship through marriage to Kuwaiti men under the prior version of Article 8 of the Nationality Law.

For Kuwaitis in the United States on student, work, or visit visas, the consequences have been compounding. The U.S. Embassy in Kuwait notified affected nationals that their U.S. visas had been revoked. Many learned of the revocation by email, sometimes weeks after the underlying Kuwaiti citizenship was stripped.

What remains, for those already inside the United States, is a narrow and time-sensitive set of legal options.

The legal mechanism is Decree-Law No. 116/2024, issued by the Emir in the months after Parliament was suspended on May 10, 2024. The decree expanded the executive’s authority to revoke citizenship and removed safeguards against statelessness that had existed in the prior nationality framework.

Three features of the decree have drawn the sharpest criticism from international observers:

• The Supreme Committee to Investigate Kuwaiti Citizenship issues revocation decisions without judicial review. Its determinations are referred to the Cabinet for approval and become effective without appeal.
• The amended Article 8 ends the prior pathway by which foreign-born women acquired Kuwaiti citizenship through marriage to Kuwaiti nationals. Existing acquisitions under the prior version are subject to revocation.
• No safeguard against statelessness. The decree authorizes revocation even where the affected person holds no other nationality.

The 1954 U.N. Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons defines a stateless person as one “who is not considered as a national by any State under the operation of its law.” A person denaturalized under Decree-Law No. 116/2024 who does not hold any other nationality meets that definition.

The United States is not a signatory to the 1954 Convention. It is a signatory to the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, which incorporates the 1951 Refugee Convention — and that framework provides the entry point for most U.S. legal options available to newly stateless Kuwaitis.

For Kuwaitis in the United States who entered before their citizenship was revoked, the most direct option is asylum on the basis of changed circumstances.

The general asylum filing deadline is one year from the date of last entry into the United States, set by INA § 208(a)(2)(B) (8 U.S.C. § 1158(a)(2)(B)). An applicant who has been in the country for more than a year would, ordinarily, be time-barred.

INA § 208(a)(2)(D) carves out an exception. An applicant may file beyond the one-year deadline if there are “either the existence of changed circumstances which materially affect the applicant’s eligibility for asylum or extraordinary circumstances relating to the delay in filing.”

A government strip of citizenship — particularly one accompanied by political persecution or risk of persecution upon return — is the classic example of a changed circumstance that materially affects eligibility. For Kuwaitis affected by Decree-Law No. 116/2024, the asylum framework also accommodates the second posture the regulation mentions: applicants whose “country of last habitual residence” has materially changed.

The application is filed on Form I-589. The applicant must file within a “reasonable period” of the changed circumstance — typically construed by USCIS asylum offices and immigration judges as within six months, though longer delays are accepted on documented facts.

Kuwaitis whose spouses remain in the United States on an active F-1 student visa may be eligible to change status to F-2 derivative under 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(f).

The change is procedurally straightforward — a Form I-539 with documentation of the marriage and the principal F-1’s status — but it comes with significant limits:

• F-2 spouses cannot accept employment. The category is for dependent presence only.
• F-2 minor children can attend K-12 school. F-2 spouses may not engage in full-time study toward a degree but may pursue avocational or recreational study.
• F-2 status is tied to the F-1’s continued status. If the principal F-1 falls out of status or completes their program, the F-2 status ends.

The F-2 option is most useful as a short-term lawful-presence bridge while other applications are pending — not as a long-term solution.

For Kuwaitis with established professional or academic accomplishments, the O-1 visa for individuals of extraordinary ability or achievement is available. The statutory basis is INA § 101(a)(15)(O) (8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(15)(O)).

The O-1 requires demonstrating sustained national or international acclaim through evidence in categories that include major awards, membership in selective organizations, published material about the applicant, original contributions of major significance, scholarly articles, and others.

The category is fact-specific. It is not a default option for most applicants. Where the applicant has a documented professional record that genuinely meets the standard — including, often, applicants in academic or research fields — the O-1 can be approved within weeks under premium processing.

Kuwaitis affiliated with institutions of higher education or qualifying nonprofit research organizations may be eligible for an H-1B cap-exempt petition under INA § 214(g)(5) (8 U.S.C. § 1184(g)(5)).

Cap-exempt H-1B petitions are not subject to the annual numerical cap and the H-1B lottery. They may be filed and approved at any time during the year. The qualifying employers are:

• Institutions of higher education, as defined in 20 U.S.C. § 1001(a).
• Nonprofit entities related to or affiliated with an institution of higher education.
• Nonprofit research organizations.
• Governmental research organizations.

The cap-exempt pathway has become a meaningful option for applicants with research, teaching, or healthcare affiliations who would otherwise face the cap lottery’s roughly one-in-four odds.

Practitioners working with denaturalized Kuwaitis have generally recommended pursuing multiple options in parallel, rather than picking one and waiting.

The reason for the layered approach is the speed and certainty of each option. Asylum confers the strongest long-term status — work authorization 150 days after filing, eligibility for adjustment after one year of granted asylum, eligibility for travel documentation — but asylum adjudication is slow, and the affirmative asylum backlog is substantial.

A pending F-2 or approved O-1 keeps the applicant in lawful nonimmigrant status while asylum is pending. A cap-exempt H-1B, where available, adds work authorization and a separate path to employment-based permanent residence if circumstances change.

For Kuwaitis in the United States who lose citizenship while abroad, the picture is grimmer. A revoked U.S. visa cannot be re-issued by a consulate to a person who is now stateless under a third country’s nationality framework. The combination of Kuwaiti revocation and U.S. visa revocation produces a population with no clear path back.

The U.N. Refugee Agency has called repeatedly on Kuwait to halt the revocation campaign and provide judicial review. Those calls have gone unanswered. As of mid-2026, the revocation process continues — and so does the corresponding administrative pressure on the U.S. legal options available to those affected.