US judge blocks Trump’s order to end birthright citizenship
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Judge rules in favor of states who sued over president’s executive order, which was set to take effect on 19 February. A federal judge on Thursday temporarily blocked Donald Trump’s executive order ending the constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship regardless of the parents’ immigration status.
US district judge John C Coughenour ruled in the case brought by the states of Washington, Arizona, Illinois and Oregon, which argue the 14th amendment and supreme court case law have cemented birthright citizenship. The case is one of five lawsuits being brought by 22 states and a number of immigrants rights groups across the country. The suits include personal testimonies from attorneys general who are US citizens by birthright, and names pregnant women who are afraid their children won’t become US citizens.
Signed by Trump on Inauguration Day, the order is slated to take effect on 19 February. It could affect hundreds of thousands of people born in the country, according to one of the lawsuits. In 2022, there were about 255,000 births of citizen children to mothers living in the country illegally and about 153,000 births to two such parents, according to the four-state suit filed in Seattle.
The US is among about 30 countries where birthright citizenship – the principle of jus soli or “right of the soil” – is applied. Most are in the Americas, and Canada and Mexico are among them. The lawsuits argue that the 14th amendment to the US constitution guarantees citizenship for people born and naturalized in the US, and states have been interpreting the amendment that way for a century.
