You have had your green card for years. You have looked at the government website and it did not seem that complicated. Somebody at work did it themselves and said it was fine.
So the question is fair, and it deserves a real answer instead of a sales pitch.
The Short Answer
Some people genuinely do not need a lawyer for this.
If you have held your green card for the required years, have never been arrested or cited for anything, have filed your taxes, have not taken long trips out of the country, and have never registered to vote or checked a box saying you were a U.S. citizen, the application is a form and an interview.
We would rather tell you that than take your money for work you did not need.
The rest of this page is about the situations where the answer changes, because they are more common than people expect and most of them do not feel like legal problems.
What Actually Changed, and Why the Old Advice Is Out of Date
Two things happened starting in 2025 that make older guidance unreliable.
One. Good moral character became a weighing exercise instead of a checklist. A 2025 policy memorandum restored what it calls a holistic standard. Its own framing is that the statutory bars are “the minimum disqualifiers, not as exclusive criteria.”
Read that carefully. The bars are the floor, not the test. Officers weigh a person’s whole record, positive and negative. Community involvement, caregiving, steady work and tax compliance count in your favor. A broader range of conduct counts against.
“I have no criminal record so I will be fine” is no longer a safe thing to assume.
Two. USCIS resumed personal investigations of naturalization applicants, under INA § 335(a), after decades of not doing them. Investigators may look into the area around where an applicant lives and works.
If that happens, nobody tells you. The investigator’s duty to identify himself and explain the inquiry runs to the person being interviewed, not to you. What protects you comes after: if USCIS intends to deny your case on something the investigation turned up, it must give you notice and a chance to answer it. You may have a lawyer at your interview, which is a different appointment.
There is also something in the current guidance that almost nobody is talking about, and it works in your favor: the investigation can be waived, and you can influence that.
The Situations That Mean Do Not File This Alone
This is the self-check. If any of these describe you, talk to someone before you file, not after.
- You have ever registered to vote, or checked a citizen box on any form. Including at a DMV, including by accident, including if nothing came of it. This one is first for a reason and it is explained below.
- You have any arrest, citation, charge or ticket in your past, including cases that were dismissed, dropped, deferred or expunged. Dismissed does not mean it disappears from this process.
- You have used marijuana, even in a state where it is legal.
- You have unfiled tax years, or you filed in a status that does not match your situation.
- You are a man who lived here between 18 and 26 and never registered for Selective Service.
- You have taken any trip out of the country longer than six months.
- There is anything unusual in how you got your green card, including something a previous lawyer or a notario did that you never fully understood.
- You are applying on the three-year track through a U.S. citizen spouse.
None of these means the answer is no. Several of them have real answers. What they mean is that the answer is not knowable from a form.
The One That Is Not Like the Others
Voter registration.
Current USCIS guidance places the burden on the applicant. If a person registered to vote, that person has to show that the registration form did not ask about citizenship, or that they did not answer that it did apply to them.
And the consequence is not a denial. The guidance provides that a person who falsely claims to be a U.S. citizen for any purpose or benefit, including registering to vote, will be issued a Notice to Appear.
That is removal proceedings, started by an application the person filed voluntarily.
A registration that happened at a DMV, quickly, years ago, in a stack of paperwork, is not a paperwork problem. If there is any chance this happened to you, this is the first question to answer and it is not one to answer alone.
What a Lawyer Actually Does Here
Not the form. The form is the easy part and anyone telling you otherwise is selling.
- Reads your history before anything gets filed, including the parts you have forgotten or were never told.
- Gets the records where the history is unclear, which is cheaper than a denial.
- Builds the character reference package that the current guidance says USCIS considers.
- Prepares you for an interview that now includes discretionary weighing rather than a checklist.
- Tells you not to file yet when that is the right answer.
If your case is weak, you hear it from us first. If there is risk, you know before anything is filed. If there is a path, you get a plan built around it.
Find Out Which One You Are
If none of the situations above apply to you, you may well be fine on your own, and we will tell you that.
If one of them does, finding out now costs you a conversation. Finding out later can cost a great deal more.
Talk it through with a bilingual team member. Bring your green card and anything from your history you are unsure about.
Law Office of Gilda McDowell. Serving families across West Texas and eastern New Mexico.
This page explains how the naturalization process works. It is not legal advice about your case, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Only a licensed attorney who has reviewed your record can tell you what applies to you. Policy in this area changed in 2025 and continues to change. Everything here was verified against the primary sources on August 28, 2026.