Birth tourism brings Russian baby boom to Miami

[camille70]

MIAMI — Lured by the charm of little Havana or the glamour of South Beach, some 15 million tourists visit Miami every year.

But for a growing number of Russian women, the draw isn't sunny beaches or pulsing nightclubs. It's U.S. citizenship for their newborn children.

In Moscow, it's a status symbol to have a Miami-born baby, and social media is full of Russian women boasting of their little americantsy.

"It's really common," said Ekaterina Kuznetsova, 29. "When I was taking the plane to come here, it was not only me. It was four or five women flying here."

Ekaterina was one of dozens of Russian birth tourists NBC News spoke to over the past four months about a round-trip journey that costs tens of thousands of dollars and takes them away from home for weeks or months.

Why do they come?

"American passport is a big plus for the baby. Why not?" Olesia Reshetova, 31, told NBC News.

"And the doctors, the level of education," Kuznetsova added.

The weather doesn't hurt, either.

"It's a very comfortable place for staying in wintertime," Oleysa Suhareva said.

Read the rest @ Made in Russia, born in America: birth tourism booming in Miami

 

[CRAZY_CAT_WOMAN]

I'm not surprised that Russians do this. I think many countries do this. But Trump doesn't care about Russians doing it. He cares about African an Mexico people coming to America.

 

[SummerMadness]

The government spends a lot of time holding up Hispanic, African and Asian immigrants, even sending some back, but they have no problem with Russian women coming over here to give birth. It does not take us much to figure out why.

 

[Trogdor the Burninator]

I still don't understand why America has this rule that anyone born in the country is granted automatic citizenship - it's just creating a situation where families are at risk of being broken up.

 

[Trogdor the Burninator]

The government spends a lot of time holding up Hispanic, African and Asian immigrants, even sending some back, but they have no problem with Russian women coming over here to give birth. It does not take us much to figure out why.

I'd say it's much more likely that it's easier to stop people who intend to immigrate.

The trick in this situation is that the parents are not trying to enter the country permanently, so short of stopping all pregnant women at the border there's very little the government can do to prevent it. The sensible option would be to change the law of course, to something more in line with most other countries which allow citizenship only to people with at least one parent born in their country.