Dekovic v. Rubio

── Dekovic v. Rubio ── Case No.: 24-1431 Court: Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit Date: March 10, 2026 Category: General Appellate Case: 24-1431 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 03/10/2026 Page: 1 FILED United States Court of Appeals PUBLISH Tenth Circuit UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS March 10, 2026 Christopher M. Wolpert FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT Clerk of Court _________________________________ DALILA DEKOVIC; ALEJANDRO JIMENEZ RAMIREZ, Plaintiffs - Appellants, v. No. 24-1431 MARCO RUBIO, United States Secretary of State; CATHERINE MCGEARY, Director, National Visa Center, United States Department of State, Defendants - Appellees. _________________________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Colorado (D.C. No. 1:23-CV-02728-REB) _________________________________ Mark Robert Barr, Lichter Immigration, Denver, Colorado, for Plaintiffs-Appellants. Christopher G. Gieger, Trial Attorney (Lindsay M. Vick, Senior Litigation Counsel, and Jessica A. Dawgert, Senior Litigation Counsel, Office of Immigration Litigation, with him on the brief), United States Department of Justice, Washington, D.C., for Defendants-Appellees. _________________________________ Before McHUGH, CARSON, and ROSSMAN, Circuit Judges. _________________________________ McHUGH, Circuit Judge. _________________________________  Appellate Case: 24-1431 Document: 50-1 Date Filed: 03/10/2026 Page: 2 This appeal presents a question that has been considered by three of our sister circuits: whether “a child of a lawful permanent resident (LPR) who was deemed by statute to be a minor child until the very day his [parent] naturalized, still qualified as a minor on that day, or whether instead his [parent’s] naturalization transformed him on the spot from a minor into an adult.” Tovar v. Sessions, 882 F.3d 895, 896 (9th Cir. 2018). As the Ninth Circuit explained in Tovar, the Government has parsed individual provisions of the labyrinthine Immigration and Nationality Act to arrive at the latter position, with the effect that a parent’s naturalization can cause a child to be deported forthwith and to wait for decades in a foreign land for an immigrant visa—a visa that he would have had in a short period of time if his parent had not become a citizen. Id. But viewing the statute as a whole, we reject this interpretation. Instead, we agree with our sister circuits that anyone who under the relevant statutes is considered a minor child of an LPR on the date of the parent’s naturalization (and who is the beneficiary of a valid petition for an immigrant visa based on that status) can obtain a visa as the minor child of a citizen following his parent’s naturalization. Id. at 896–97. We therefore reverse the district court’s entry of judgment in favor of the Government and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. I. LEGAL OVERVIEW To properly evaluate the issue before us in this appeal, “we need to review not only the various steps in the process of seeking a visa but also the special rules that apply to each of the distinct types of visas that are in play.” Teles de Menezes v. Rubio, 156 F.4th 1, 3 (1st Cir. 2025). We therefore “spend some time up front