An Alabama woman who left home to join the Islamic State group in Syria is not a U.S. citizen and will not be allowed to return to the United States, according to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
Pompeo claimed that Hoda Muthana, who says she made a mistake in joining the group and now wants to return with her 18-month-old son, has no 'legal basis' to claim American citizenship.
He said in a brief statement that the 24-year-old does not have a U.S. passport. Pompeo's statement offered no details as to how the determination was reached.
'Ms Hoda Muthana is not a U.S. citizen and will not be admitted into the United States,' Pompeo said. 'She does not have any legal basis, no valid U.S. passport, no right to a passport nor any visa to travel to the United States.'
The statement contradicts those made by Muthana and her family's attorney, who say she was born in Hackensack, New Jersey and raised in Hoover, Alabama.
Hoda Muthana, who says she made a mistake in joining ISIS and now wants to return with her 18-month-old son, has no 'legal basis' to claim American citizenship, according to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. She is pictured during an ABC interview on Wednesday
Muthana, who left America four years ago to join ISIS, has previously been issued two U.S. passports - one when she was a child and another in 2014.
An attorney for her family, Hassan Shibly, said the U.S. government is trying to base their position on a 'complicated' interpretation of the law involving her father because he was a Yemeni diplomat.
'They're claiming her dad was a diplomat when she was born, which, in fact, he wasn't,' Shibly said.
Most people born in the United States are given so-called birthright citizenship.
But under the Immigration and Nationality Act, a person born in the U.S. to a foreign diplomatic officer is not subject to U.S. law and is not automatically considered a U.S. citizen at birth.
Shibly said Muthana was born in 1994 in Hackensack, New Jersey.
He claims that Muthana's father was discharged from his United Nations post one month before his daughter was born, which means the exception to the law is not valid in her case.
Pompeo said Hoda, who left home to join the Islamic State group in Syria, is not a U.S. citizen and will not be allowed to return to the United States
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a brief statement that the 24-year-old does not have a U.S. passport. Pompeo's statement offered no details as to how the determination was reached
Meanwhile, a British teen who joined ISIS in Syria had her UK citizenship revoked on Wednesday.
Shamima Begum, who travelled to Syria in 2015 and now wants to return to Britain after giving birth in a refugee camp in Syria last week, said she was shocked by the government decision.
Prior to Pompeo's statement, Muthana said in an interview with ABC News earlier on Wednesday that she hoped the U.S. government would pay for her to undergo therapy if she was allowed to return.
'I'm a normal human
