The Supreme Court agreed Friday to hear arguments over the legality of Donald Trump's plan to end birthright citizenship, an 1868 constitutional detail that gives anyone born on U.S. soil the right to a U.S. passport.
At the same time, the country's highest judicial system has prepared the ground for a decision, which is expected by the end of June. undermine Fourteenth Amendment. This amendment guarantees citizenship to anyone born or naturalized in the United States.
Trump attempted to end the constitutionally enshrined right just hours after he was sworn in in January, signing an executive order saying children born to immigrants on temporary visas or in the country illegally should not be entitled to primogeniture status. Over the past year, the order has been blocked by several judges in several judicial districts.
In a case that the Supreme Court has agreed to hear, prompted by doubts in New Hampshire, the Trump administration argues that language included in the amendment—specifically, “subject to jurisdiction”—requires eligible children not only to be present in the country at the time of birth, but also to express their allegiance to the United States. However, it is unclear exactly how newborns will do this.
“Long after the passage of this section, the erroneous belief that birth on U.S. soil confers citizenship on anyone subject to U.S. regulations has become widespread, with devastating consequences,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in legal arguments on behalf of the administration.
Sauer added that the purpose of Trump's order is to “restore the original meaning of this clause.”
This is not the first time this year that the Supreme Court has heard arguments on this topic.
In May, judges from both ideological sides of the court flaming the Trump administration's efforts to rewrite birthright citizenship through the American courts, questioning why government lawyers even brought the case to the doorstep of the judiciary when “every court has ruled against” the administration's birthright citizenship.
At that time, Justice Brett Kavanaugh pressed Sauer was backed into a corner, forcing the attorney general to admit that the Trump administration doesn't even know how it will enforce its birthright citizenship order. Sauer managed to horrify another Trump appointee, Judge Amy Coney Barrett, by declaring that Trump has “right» ignore legal opinions with which he personally disagrees.
