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Many new citizens register to vote immediately after their naturalization ceremony.
An Isthmus reader asks why there are no naturalization ceremonies held in Madison. The reader is eager to help register these new citizens to vote, as is often done where these ceremonies are held.
The answer has partly to do with the courts and partly to do with the capacity of volunteers and local organizations.
Naturalization ceremonies — where permanent residents become new U.S. citizens, giving them the right to vote, travel freely, and receive a U.S. passport — are presided over by a federal judge and often take place in federal courthouses. The federal court in Wisconsin is divided into the Western District, with a courthouse in Madison, and Eastern District, with courthouses in Milwaukee and Green Bay.
“At the federal courthouse [in Madison], we typically do not organize naturalization ceremonies,” says Joel Turner, clerk of courts for the Western District. Instead, the Eastern District handles those for almost all of Wisconsin. Most naturalization ceremonies are held in the federal courthouse in Milwaukee, and only on special occasions are they held in Madison, with those still organized through the Eastern District. “There has been some general discussion to hold a naturalization ceremony at the [state] Capitol,” he says, but “nothing concrete” yet.
Bringing a ceremony to Madison typically gets started with an organized effort from volunteers. Before the pandemic, Madison organizations co-sponsored some naturalization ceremonies at the Capitol.
One of those groups was Open Doors for Refugees. The all-volunteer organization had an event committee that spent about six months making arrangements for each ceremony, including securing a federal judge from Madison to preside over the ceremonies. Madeline Uraneck, a member of the group, says the Madison ceremonies were able to offer a bit more “pomp and circumstance” than ceremonies at the Milwaukee courthouse that can be more “cut and dried.”
“We don’t know quite why these ceremonies are so moving, but they kind of catch people on the right, left and middle with a lump in their throat,” says Uraneck. “These people are choosing to become U.S. citizens after going through all of what they’ve been through.”
While in the preliminary stages, Uraneck says Open Doors for Refugees volunteers are interested in once again arranging naturalization ceremonies in Madison.
