Jermaine Thomas was born in 1986 on a U.S. Army base in Germany to an active-duty American soldier and spent his childhood moving from base to base. But last week, the 39-year-old was deported to Jamaica—a country he had never set foot in.
Thomas’s father, a Jamaican immigrant who gained U.S. citizenship during his 18 years in the Army, raised his son alongside Thomas’s mother, a Kenyan citizen at the time of his birth. After his parents divorced, Thomas moved to Florida to live with his now-retired father. Tragically, his father died of kidney failure shortly after Thomas arrived.
Since then, Thomas’s life unraveled. He struggled with homelessness and was in and out of jail while living in Texas.
His citizenship status became a subject of a years-long legal fight. In 2015, the Department of Justice argued that Thomas was not automatically a U.S. citizen despite being born on an American military base. The Supreme Court ultimately sided with the DOJ, saying his father didn’t meet the physical presence requirement under the immigration law in effect at the time of Thomas’s birth.
The court also cited Thomas’s criminal record, which includes one domestic violence conviction and two convictions classified as “crimes involving moral turpitude.”
Stateless and without legal status in the U.S., Germany, or Jamaica, Thomas continued to live in Texas, most recently in Killeen.
His deportation began after he was evicted from his apartment. While moving out, local police arrested him for misdemeanor trespassing. With no money and no job—he lost his employment during his time in jail—Thomas agreed to a release deal, hoping to avoid a long pretrial detention. But instead of being freed, he was transferred to an ICE detention center near Houston. He remained there for over two months before being deported to Kingston.
Now in Jamaica, Thomas says he’s living in a hotel—though he’s unsure who is paying for it, or how long he’ll be allowed to stay. He doesn’t know if he can legally work, or if he’s even recognized as a legal resident of the country.
“If you’re in the U.S. Army, and the Army sends you overseas, and your child is born while you’re serving, then years later your child makes a mistake and you’ve already passed away—should that child be kicked out of the country you served?” Thomas asked in a phone interview with The Austin Chronicle.
Neither ICE nor the Department of Homeland Security responded to requests for comment.
His story underscores the legal and human complexities facing children of U.S. service members born abroad—especially when bureaucratic technicalities, criminal histories, and lack of documentation collide.
