Donald Trump wants to end birthright citizenship. It’s a talking point he made in 2018 during his presidency that never came to fruition. Now, he’s saying that if elected in 2024, he will once again attempt to end automatic citizenship for children born in the U.S. to undocumented parents.
The 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution grants citizenship to all persons “born or naturalized in the United States.” In a video from @TrumpWarRoom posted on Tuesday (May 30), Trump referred to the 14th Amendment as “a reward for breaking the laws of the United States and is obviously a magnet helping draw the flood of illegals across our borders.”
Trump added that these “border crossers” come from “mental institutions [and] jails” and are “some of the toughest, meanest people you’ll ever see.” Coming from Trump, it isn’t surprising he thinks this as in 2015 he said that Mexico was sending drug dealers and rapists to the U.S. “and some, I assume, are good people.”
He continued to say that the 14th Amendment is a “misinterpretation of the law by open-border advocates” and vowed on Day 1 of his second term to use an executive order to instruct federal agencies to stop the lawful act. Critics of Trump’s plan agree that any executive order to end birthright citizenship would face challenges in court.
The Constitution’s 14th Amendment was ratified in 1868, three years after the end of the Civil War. It overturned the 1857 Dred Scott v. Sandford case where the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that enslaved people were not American citizens.
If Trump were somehow able to use executive power to change the law, he would require any child born in the U.S. to have at least one parent be an American citizen or lawful permanent resident to become an automatic U.S. citizen.