---
kind: "section"
citation: "8 U.S.C. § 1402"
title: "8"
title_heading: "Aliens and Nationality"
number: "1402"
heading: "Persons born in Puerto Rico on or after April 11, 1899"
release: "119-102"
date: "2026-07-12"
url: "https://uscodex.org/usc/8/1402"
units:
  - "Chapter 12 — Immigration and Nationality"
  - "Subchapter III — Nationality and Naturalization"
  - "Part I — Nationality at Birth and Collective Naturalization"
---

# §1402. Persons born in Puerto Rico on or after April 11, 1899


All [persons](/usc/8/1101.md?p=b-3) born in Puerto Rico on or after April 11, 1899, and prior to January 13, 1941, subject to the jurisdiction of the [United States](/usc/8/1101.md?p=a-38), residing on January 13, 1941, in Puerto Rico or other territory over which the [United States](/usc/8/1101.md?p=a-38) exercises rights of sovereignty and not citizens of the [United States](/usc/8/1101.md?p=a-38) under any other Act, are declared to be citizens of the [United States](/usc/8/1101.md?p=a-38) as of January 13, 1941. All [persons](/usc/8/1101.md?p=b-3) born in Puerto Rico on or after January 13, 1941, and subject to the jurisdiction of the [United States](/usc/8/1101.md?p=a-38), are citizens of the [United States](/usc/8/1101.md?p=a-38) at birth.


## Source credit

(June 27, 1952, ch. 477, title III, ch. 1, § 302, 66 Stat. 236.)