[thinkthenpost]

My take on the article is that he is British and happened to be born in New York.
I did not get the impression he has ever resided in the States, he even states at the beginning of the article though rather oddly he is an American citizen basically b accident of birth. I would safe it is a timing issue. I don't know why he had an American passport, but I would suspect with an American Birth certificate it was easier to get an American passport when he was a baby to go home to jolly old England.
I still don't understand the rule requiring entry under an American passport if you are entitled to another countries passport and choose to use the other passport.

[Old Student]

"I did not get the impression he has ever resided in the States, he even states at the beginning of the article though rather oddly he is an American citizen basically b accident of birth. "

If he was born here, and hasn't already renounced citizenship, he's an American citizen. By Law. If his parents were tourists or resident aliens, by the laws of Great Britain, he may also have citizenship there, but by our law, he is one of us. Period. I got the impression from the article that he's traveled here on an American passport before, and just failed to renew it, and that is why he was told he needed to renew if he wanted to reenter the US. A passport is only good for 7 years, unless they've changed since I last had one, a little over ten years ago.