Naturalized Citizens Means More Voters

Updated: Thursday, 16 Jun 2011, 3:00 PM CDT
Published : Thursday, 16 Jun 2011, 3:00 PM CDT
JOHN DONNELLY Reporter

HOUSTON - For a crowd of more than 2,200 people, Thursday may have been the most important day of their lives.

The group took the oath of citizenship Thursday morning at the M.O. Campbell Education Center on Aldine Bender Road. The naturalized citizens emigrated from more than 120 different countries and arrived in the U.S. as legal immigrants.

U.S. District Judge Gray Miller, himself the son of a naturalized citizen, administered the oath of citizenship.

At least one new American who has lived in the U.S. a long time told FOX 26 News it took her spending some time out of the U.S. to make her want to become a citizen.

Representatives from the League of Women Voters of the Houston Area were trying to get as many of the new Americans as possible to register to vote. Linda W. Cohn, a spokewoman for the organization told FOX 26 that typically 80 percent of the naturalized citizens register to vote the same day they are sworn in; 1,703 of the 2,210 naturalized citizens registered Thursday.

http://www.myfoxhouston.com/dpp/news/lo ... n-ceremony