Trump Administration Takes Birthright Citizenship Fight to Supreme Court

Donald Trump's administration has intensified its legal battle over birthright citizenship by appealing to the Supreme Court. Trump's executive order aims to deny automatic citizenship to children born in the U.S. whose parents have either an unlawful presence or hold temporary lawful status in the country. His administration now seeks to have limits placed on judicial rulings that have blocked the order across the nation.

In petitions filed to the Supreme Court, acting solicitor general Sarah Harris argued primarily about courts' authority to apply nationwide injunctions. Harris asserted that injunctions should be restricted only to those states that challenged the executive order and subsequently won in their lawsuits. If granted, Trump's administration could start implementing its controversial policy in all other states.

Federal courts in Massachusetts, Maryland, and Washington have issued broad, overlapping nationwide injunctions against the policy, following challenges from 22 states as well as various immigrant advocacy organizations and other groups. The Trump administration contends that these universal injunctions have become excessively common since Trump took office, complaining that court decisions have increasingly affected people who were neither present nor identified in the lawsuits.

The contentious executive order attempts to reinterpret the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment, which grants citizenship to anyone born or naturalized in the U.S., who is subject to U.S. jurisdiction. Historically, this amendment was implemented to reverse discriminatory practices like the Supreme Court's infamous Dred Scott decision and ensure citizenship rights extended to formerly enslaved individuals.

Previous Supreme Court decisions have firmly upheld birthright citizenship. For example, in 1898 the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Wong Kim Ark, a San Francisco-born child of Chinese descent, establishing that birth in the United States grants automatic citizenship. Despite clear Supreme Court precedent, right-wing groups recently revived arguments challenging this interpretation, specifically focusing on the term "jurisdiction" to claim it implies political allegiance rather than simply geographic presence.

Trump's administration’s attempt faced harsh criticism from federal courts. Notably, Maryland District Judge Deborah L. Boardman stated that the executive order contradicts 250 years of U.S. history regarding birthright citizenship and potentially violates established Supreme Court precedent. Judge Boardman indicated that no court had yet validated the administration’s interpretation and emphasized clearly that her court would also refuse to endorse such an argument.