Soaring applications in part due to 'lost Canadians' changes to immigration law

Less than nine months after Parliament allowed those with Canadian ancestors to be recognized as Canadian citizens, the backlog of applications has soared to a new high.

More than 136,000 applications for citizenship certificates are now waiting for a decision — many of them from Americans. Those who apply today face an estimated wait of 33 months, according to figures posted on Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC)'s website.

That is a 32 per cent jump in wait time and an 11 per cent rise in the number of applications since the previous update on Aug. 10.

In May 2025, prior to Bill C-3 going into effect, the estimated processing time for citizenship certificate applications was five months.

Christine Beltempo, president of the Canadian Bar Association's immigration section and a lawyer with McCarthy Tétrault, said her members are concerned about the "exponential increase" of processing times for citizenship certificate applications.

"We have known since the first drafts of Bill C-3 that this would cause a lot of uptake in the number of applications for proof of citizenship," Beltempo said.

Demand for Canadian citizenship certificates soaring, fuelled by Americans

Government abruptly suspends citizenship certificates issued under 'lost Canadians' law

Beltempo said IRCC needs to assign more people to process the applications, and that she expects the volume to further increase next year.

"I think it would be nice to see the department devoting more resources to this business line so that processing times can go back to what I would consider to be normal standards for people who are presumably Canadians," she said.

IRCC spokesperson Briannah Dale said the increase is influenced by a range of factors — not just Bill C-3.

"The department is continuing to monitor application trends and volumes and is implementing operational measures to respond to increased demand, including triaging applications, enhancing intake processes, training and onboarding additional staff and refining workload management practices," Dale said.

The spokesperson said processing times can vary and the 33-month estimate reflects the increased volume and "complexity of many applications" that "often require substantial documentary evidence and additional verification."

Prior to Bill C-3, Canadian citizenship by descent was limited to the first generation born or adopted outside Canada to a Canadian citizen. However, that limitation on citizenship for those who became known as "lost Canadians" was struck down by the courts as unconstitutional.

Under Bill C-3, which went into effect Dec. 15, people living in other countries who can trace their lineage from Canadian ancestors can qualify for Canadian citizenship even if their Canadian ancestor left Canada several generations back.

Diab told a parliamentary committee in October 2025 that the impact of Bill C-3 would be limited.

"We anticipate volumes in the tens of thousands over time," she said. "We do not expect any surge."

However, since the adoption of Bill C-3, Canada's archives have been deluged with requests for the documents needed to prove lineage to a Canadian ancestor — sometimes going back seven or eight generations — as the number of applications soared.

As of May 31, the most recent data provided by IRCC, half of those who have been recognized as Canadian citizens as a result of Bill C-3 were born in the United States.

Citizenship certificates granted between Dec. 15 and June under all categories — including Bill C-3, first generation or replacement certificates — were divided fairly evenly when it came to gender. IRCC said 16,250 were granted to male applicants, 16,285 to female applicants and 45 to applicants who listed their gender as "other." The gender of another 55 applicants was unknown.

While discussion on social media has speculated that older Americans are applying for Canadian citizenship to move to Canada and qualify for universal health care, the numbers show only 3,650 certificates of all types went to people over age 55. The largest age demographic was applicants under age 14 with 16,435 certificates. Many of those may have been issued for babies born to Canadians abroad.

The IRCC stats show 2,880 certificate recipients were between the ages of 14 and 17 while 18-54-year-olds accounted for 9,670 certificates.

A citizenship certificate allows you to do things like move to Canada or get a Canadian passport. However, Elections Canada says it doesn't allow someone to vote in a Canadian election unless they have lived in Canada at some point in their life.

It would also not allow them to cast a ballot in things like Alberta's upcoming sovereignty referendum unless they moved to that province. Elections Alberta says expats and Canadian citizens not ordinarily residing in Alberta aren't eligible to vote in provincial election events.

Immigration lawyer Colin Singer says IRCC's failure to deal with the growing backlog could end up in court, and that the delays could violate the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

"For professionals seeking cross-border employment, students applying to universities and families trying to relocate, these delays are severe economic roadblocks," Singer wrote.

Singer said applicants stuck in the backlog could eventually apply to Federal Court for a writ of mandamus, asking the court to set a deadline for IRCC to process their application.

NDP immigration critic Jenny Kwan said Prime Minister Mark Carney's government needs to ensure that IRCC has the resources to address the "growing crisis," pointing out that the government's last budget called for 3,300 positions to be cut by 2028-29.

"It is completely unacceptable that people who have a legitimate claim to Canadian citizenship, passed in legislation by Parliament, are being left in limbo," she said in a statement.

"Families [are] facing enormous disruption to their ability to travel, work, study, access services and plan their lives."

Canada's immigration department cutting roughly 3,300 jobs over 3 years

Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel Garner said members of her party warned the government about the issues that citizenship by descent could raise.

"The Liberals assured us that there would be processes in place to help deal with the surge of applications that came alongside citizenship by descent," she wrote in a statement. "This was clearly untrue."

But Rempel Garner said "the absolute worst thing" the government could do is "mass approve" the backlogged applications.

Canadian citizenship certificate applications now facing nearly 3-year delays