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My US passport expired in february and I am flying to the US in 2 weeks.

I have dual citizenship, which means I also have a Danish passport, but my application for ESTA was denied since I technically hold US citizenship - although my residency is currently in Europe.

I will only be in the US for a memorial for 4 days.

What should I do? Can I travel on the expired US passport?

In Denmark it is not easy to get a passport renewal done quickly as the consulate is completely backed up and almost impossible to get in touch with.

phoog
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Katrina Golden
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2 Answers2

7

As a US citizen you cannot be denied entry into the United States. So as long as you can show up at the border and present reasonable proof that you are a US citizen (expired passport, birth certificate, US license, voter registrations, etc), you will eventually get in.

CBP may give you a hard time and you may have to spent significant extra time in secondary inspection but legally they are required to let you in.

However, you need to get yourself to the border first. Any airline is highly unlikely to let you board a plane without a valid passport or ESTA, since they may get fined by the US for this. Potentially you can try to to get an eTA for Canada and make your way to the land border. Nothing about this would be easy or pleasant so you have to weigh your options here.

Hilmar
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Welcome new user!

  1. It is utterly, totally, completely inconceivable you can fly to the US with an expired passport.

Nothing more need be said on that.

  1. It's weird you were not able to get an ESTA with your ordinary Danish passport but, so be it. Normally you just don't mention any other passports. But what's done is done.

  2. I'm not Danish, and nor do I hold nor would I ever hold a US passport, but as a general rule it is extremely hard to urgently renew a passport when you are not in the country in question. It's very, very, easy to renew a US passport, within hours, if you are in the USA. (Newsflash: governments love you giving them money. :/ ) I fear it will be difficult/impossible to renew your US passport urgently when you are not in the USA.

In true, honest-to-God emergencies (involving nuclear plants, politicians hiding money, etc) there may be a route, but I fear there's no chance this would apply here. Sorry for the downer news.

Fattie
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