>Implying US citizenship is one of the most valuable things a person can have

This attitude makes me want to vomit. The American Exceptionalism attitude of "we're the best country on Earth" is the root of so many problems in today's world.

Please check your ego.

This is one of the most unthought-out posts I've ever seen on HN.

A) Please do some research and determine if in fact you must cede your US citizenship in order to become a Columbian citizen, plenty of countries have dual-citizenship agreements with the United States.

B) "gave up one of the most valuable things anyone could have" -- Please qualify that. What exactly does he get for his American citizenship? Sure he can live here without being hassled for a Visa, but if he's married to an American citizen, then that point is moot. This isn't Sweden where citizenship entitles one to heavily subsidized healthcare/childcare/higher education or Switzerland where citizens might soon be entitled to an unconditional income. The right to a social security number, some paltry Welfare income and the ability to tell your friends that you live in the "land of the free, home of the brave" is not exactly much of a birthright.

You do not have to give up your US citizenship to gain citizenship in another country. Even if you tell Colombia you will, at any point you can tell the US you never intended to cede citizenship, and you are an US Citizen again. It's VERY hard to lose citizenship (at least, as a natural born citizen).

The US permits dual citizenship, without treaties, by default. If a person is a US citizen, it does not recognize that person's other nationality. This simply means that it's ok if you are American and French, but the US treats you as American, and ignores the French bit..

My understanding when researching my own dual-citizenship is that you do not loose your American nationality when acquiring another nationality unless it was your intent to do so. Some countries require that you do this as a condition of nationalization (and some make exceptions for marriage, previous family ties, etc). So if you acquired a second nationality in a country that required this, knew that it meant giving up your US nationality, and willingly did so, you would no longer be American. Whether or you or the second country mention this to the US authorities is a totally separate matter, which can result in some interesting consequences later.

So if you need to renounce your previous citizenship as a condition of becoming, say, Columbian, then you would no longer be American (probably). Seeing as though he became Columbian through presidential decree, I'm guessing Columbia didn't make him do this. So now he is a dual-national, but from the US government's perspective he is American.

I've read a bit about cases where even if you renounce your US citizenship to the foreign government to become a new nationality, you can still tell the US Govt 'I was just kidding to those foreigners', and you're fine. It's only really an issue if you renounce it to the US Govt directly.

Yes I've also heard about people 'renouncing' their American nationality to foreign governments, not informing the US, keeping their passport, and not having any issues. I've also heard about people exaggerating facts to ensure their children (born abroad) obtain US citizenship (possible if the parents are American and have lived in the US for some amount of years - there's the catch).

The problem is that you really don't want to be in a limbo state with your citizenship. Some politicians or bureaucrats in the future could decide that there are a lot of people abroad collecting social security, let's audit their citizenship.

I'm not sure the IOC's requirements but I think you can compete for a country if you have just familial or racial ties with a country. Technically, the country just has to recognize you as theirs.