On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will hold a hearing on President Donald Trump’s attempt to end automatic citizenship for nearly all babies born in the United States, regardless of their parents’ immigration status.
As the week began on Monday, the president posted about the subject from his Truth Social account, giving an inaccurate background of the issue that suggests he may understand that, as with the tariffs case, his administration is unlikely to win.
Here’s what Trump posted:
Birthright Citizenship is not about rich people from China, and the rest of the World, who want their children, and hundreds of thousands more, FOR PAY, to ridiculously become citizens of the United States of America. It is about the BABIES OF SLAVES! We are the only Country in the World that dignifies this subject with even discussion. Look at the dates of this long ago legislation — THE EXACT END OF THE CIVIL WAR! The World is getting rich selling citizenships to our Country, while at the same time laughing at how STUPID our U.S. Court System has become (TARIFFS!). ‘Dumb Judges and Justices will not a great Country make!’
Multiple things are incorrect or misleading in that short post.
One of them is that we aren’t the only country with birthright citizenship.
Another point, which may be more relevant to the legal issue, is that the operative time frame isn’t only the post-Civil War period, when the 14th Amendment was ratified. The amendment’s citizenship clause says, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
Rather, 20th century legislation that mirrors the amendment’s provision of birthright citizenship is a separate ground on which the justices could rule against Trump’s executive order, which seeks to singlehandedly redefine citizenship in the face of the Constitution, law and precedent.
Trump may be closer to the mark when he refers to “TARIFFS!” in connection with how “STUPID” he thinks the U.S. court system is (a system from which he has greatly benefited, although not in every single case he wants). It makes sense to refer to the tariffs case in the same breath as the citizenship case, because the latter is another rare example of a key Trump policy that may lose even at this Supreme Court, because of how obviously illegal it is.
Monday’s post follows another one last month that apparently sought to soften the blow of a possible birthright citizenship loss. Fresh off his tariffs defeat, Trump wrote then that the “next thing you know,” the court will rule against him on birthright citizenship. He added 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.”
We should get a better sense on Wednesday whether the president is correct, when we hear the justices’ questions and comments to the lawyers arguing the case. But, as the president has foreshadowed, it would be surprising if he has reason to get happier about this issue as the week goes on.
The post Birthright citizenship is at the Supreme Court this week. The president is sweating. appeared first on MS NOW.
Author: Source Author
From MS Now.