House Majority Whip Tom Emmer is teeing up a new bill that would give federal authorities a clearer pathway to revoke the citizenship of some naturalized Americans who are convicted of serious crimes. The Stop Citizenship Abuse and Misrepresentation Act, nicknamed the SCAM Act, is aimed at people convicted of fraud against the federal government, those tied to foreign terrorist organizations, and anyone found guilty of an aggravated felony within ten years of becoming a citizen. The proposal arrives as Minnesota’s sprawling fraud scandals keep the state in an unflattering national spotlight.
Early details surfaced in a national dispatch from KEYE/CBS Austin, which reported that the SCAM Act would “clarify what kind of evidence the federal government can use” when arguing that a naturalized citizen never actually met the legal requirements for citizenship. In a separate interview with Fox News, Emmer put it more bluntly: “If you came to this country to harm and take advantage of the American people, I’ve got news for you: you’re going home.”
How the SCAM Act Would Work
According to those early accounts, the bill would give prosecutors more explicit authority to use a broader range of evidence to argue that a naturalized person “never met the requirements for naturalization” and therefore obtained citizenship fraudulently. A related Republican measure in the Senate would similarly tie certain fraud convictions to deportation and expand courts’ authority to revoke citizenship, a proposal listed on Congress.gov. Supporters describe the package as a way to hold accountable people accused of stealing taxpayer dollars or aiding foreign terrorist groups.
Minnesota Is the Immediate Backdrop
The timing is not subtle. Federal prosecutors are still unwinding multiple pandemic-era fraud schemes in Minnesota, including the high-profile Feeding Our Future case, which authorities say involved around $250 million in bogus reimbursement claims and has already produced dozens of indictments. Reporting by the Associated Press notes that investigators believe the total fraud tied to several state programs could reach into the billions of dollars and that more than 50 defendants have pleaded guilty in cases connected to the broader probe.
Legal Implications and Constraints
Stripping citizenship is legally possible, but it is no simple matter. Federal law permits denaturalization when citizenship was “procured by concealment of a material fact or by willful misrepresentation,” yet courts have repeatedly emphasized constitutional limits on taking citizenship away without proof tied directly to the original naturalization. The Department of Justice signaled a tougher approach last year, issuing Civil Division guidance that directed government lawyers to “prioritize and maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings,” according to a DOJ release. Legal analyses and congressional research point out that statutes and precedent require the government to show that naturalization itself was obtained through fraud or misrepresentation, a standard shaped in part by cases such as Maslenjak v. United States and summarized in Congressional Research Service material on naturalization policy.
What Comes Next
Emmer’s House bill would still have to clear committee scrutiny and likely face robust legal and political challenges. On the other side of the Capitol, a companion Senate measure has already been filed and sent to the Judiciary Committee, with senators including Marsha Blackburn and Ted Budd backing related fraud-and-denaturalization proposals. The Senate version is posted on Congress.gov, and a January Senate press release describes a bicameral Republican push to make certain fraud convictions an explicit basis for denaturalization and deportation.
Whether the SCAM Act becomes law will hinge on week-to-week maneuvers in Washington and on how courts view any expansion of denaturalization powers. For now, the proposal underscores a growing Republican strategy to link immigration enforcement to headline-grabbing fraud cases, with Minnesota’s scandals serving as Exhibit A.
