Fifty people from around the world became U.S. citizens at the World Food & Music Festival’s Naturalization Ceremony in Des Moines Friday.
Immigration Attorney Anne Johnson says it takes a long time for citizenship applications to be processed. She says people wait at least a year to get their green cards, and another five years to begin the application for citizenship. Some refugees may spend 17 years in a foreign refugee camp before they can even come to the U.S. “I can’t even fathom what they go through, and I think that our country is blessed with their values and their work ethic,” Johnson says.
They waved U.S. flags and posed for photos with the judge conducting the ceremony. Twenty-two-year-old Ericlyn Bowa is originally from Côte d’Ivoire. “It means everything, especially in this new, like era of time. It’s really important for me to have my citizenship. It just makes me feel secure. I feel like I can do anything, go anywhere, and just have that freedom,” she says…