If there’s one line to take away from Wednesday’s Supreme Court hearing in the birthright citizenship case, it might be this: “It’s a new world. It’s the same Constitution.”    

Those words were spoken by Chief Justice John Roberts, who I predict will be with — and will possibly lead — the majority of the court in rejecting President Donald Trump’s bid to single-handedly redefine that citizenship.

Roberts’ words came as a retort to an argument from Solicitor General John Sauer, who sought to defend Trump’s executive order in the face of the Constitution, the law and precedent that have long stood for a basic premise of American life: If you’re born here, you’re a citizen.

During Sauer’s opening remarks, the former Trump personal lawyer referred to “birth tourism” while complaining that “uncounted thousands of foreigners from potentially hostile nations have flocked to give birth in the United States in recent decades, creating a whole generation of American citizens abroad with no meaningful ties to the United States.”

Later in the hearing, Roberts returned to the subject, asking Sauer: “Do you have any information about how common that is, or how significant a problem it is?”

Sauer called the question a “great” one but said that “no one knows for sure.”

That was an odd way to start an answer about a claim that even partly underpins the government’s attempt to redefine what it means to be an American.

The solicitor general then turned to citing “media reports” that estimate more than 1 million people coming from China, as well as a congressional report about“Russian elites” going to Miami through “birth tourism companies.” He said the “media reported” that “based on Chinese media reports,” there have been at least 500 such companies in China.

“Having said all that,” Roberts replied, “you do agree that that has no impact on the legal analysis before us?”

That’s a judicial way of saying it’s irrelevant.

Sauer maintained that “we’re in a new world now, as Justice [Samuel] Alito pointed out to, where 8 billion people are one plane ride away from having a child who’s a U.S. citizen.”

That’s when the chief justice replied, “Well, it’s a new world. It’s the same Constitution.”

If the court holds true to that principle, then Trump will lose this case.

While key justices in the Republican-appointed majority questioned the position of both Sauer and the American Civil Liberties Union’s Cecillia Wang, the government should be feeling less confident than the ACLU in the outcome.

In an apparently unprecedented atmospheric aspect of the case, the president attended the argument and saw Sauer advocate on his behalf. If he understood what he saw, then he shouldn’t be happy.

But he shouldn’t be surprised either, as he seemed to understand when he complained, after his rare loss in the tariffs case in February, that the court would likely rule against him on birthright citizenship, too. In the wake of his tariffs defeat, Trump wrote on his Truth Social account that the court “will find a way to come to the wrong conclusion, one that again will make China, and various other Nations, happy and rich.”

Yet even the possibility that his fringe position will get any votes in this case is remarkable. “Blatantly unconstitutional” is what one federal judge called the executive order that sparked this litigation. Due to the administration’s series of lower court losses, the order hasn’t taken effect. If the high court continues that streak, it never will. If it does take effect, then it will change the country.

As Sauer alluded to in the exchange with Roberts, Alito might be the most likely justice to cast such a vote for the government, though the precise breakdown and rationale of the court’s forthcoming ruling won’t be known until it’s published, which is expected to happen by early July.

Subscribe to the Deadline: Legal Newsletter for expert analysis on the top legal stories of the week, including updates from the Supreme Court and developments in the Trump administration’s legal cases.

The post How John Roberts’ retort sums up the case against Trump’s birthright citizenship order appeared first on MS NOW.

Author: Source Author

From MS Now.