One of the very first executive orders President Trump signed on Jan. 20, 2025, may eventually bear fruit by restricting birthright citizenship — an issue that’s been a driving force for illegal immigration into the United States for decades.
Trump’s order attempts to deny American citizenship to any child born in the United States whose parents are not legally in the country.
Since then federal district court judges in three states — Washington, Maryland, and Massachusetts — filed preliminary injunctions to bar the administration from enforcing the executive order anywhere in the United States.
The Trump administration petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday of last week to permit it to enforce its order and at least partially lift the injunctions.
Acting U.S. Solicitor General Sarah Harris argued on behalf of the administration that the U.S. district judges lack the authority to enjoin the entire country.
She said such orders "transgress constitutional limits on courts' powers" and "compromise the Executive Branch’s ability to carry out its functions."
Harris wrote, "This Court should declare that enough is enough before district courts’ burgeoning reliance on universal injunctions becomes further entrenched."
The high court could have simply denied the administration’s request outright, and that would have ended the issue.
Instead, on Friday it gave all states and organizations that are challenging the executive order until April 4 to respond to the administration’s arguments.
Those states that are challenging the order claim that anyone born in the United States is automatically an American citizen on the basis of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.
That amendment provides that "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."
Eighteen states have filed briefs with the high court supporting the president’s executive order, including South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson, who said the 14th Amendment has been misapplied, and believes Trump’s executive order has a reasonable chance of passing muster.
"That amendment was rightfully designed to bestow citizenship on emancipated slaves, which needed to happen, but it has been misinterpreted over the last 160 years to incentivize the ridiculous notion that somebody can come to the United States in the dead of night, drop a child like an anchor, like a boat drops an anchor, and all of a sudden, they have been bestowed citizenship for henceforth evermore," Wilson told The Hill.
"That was not the intention of the framers of the 14th Amendment," he added.
The 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution are known as the Reconstruction Amendments. They were ratified after the Civil War to address the legal and political status of former slaves.
The amendments abolished slavery, established citizenship, and equal protection, and granted the right to vote. They were silent on the issue of someone entering the country illegally, having a baby, and declaring the child a U.S. citizen.
Wilson gave an example of a woman from China or associated with a terrorist organization such as ISIS or Hezbollah, going to the United States for the express purpose of delivering a child and automatically declaring it a U.S. citizen.
Wilson told The Hill "this executive order has created a vehicle for us to go to the Supreme Court to get clarity on this issue."
And so it is.
It’s reminiscent of a line from Charles Dickens' "Oliver Twist."
“If the law supposes that," said Mr. Bumble, squeezing his hat emphatically in both hands, "the law is a ass — a idiot."
Again, and so it is.
It’s one thing to be secretly infiltrated by an enemy — someone who wishes to do us harm.
It’s another thing altogether to invite them in, then give them U.S. citizenship.
Michael Dorstewitz is a retired lawyer and is a frequent contributor to Newsmax. He's also a former U.S. Merchant Marine officer and a Second Amendment supporter. Read Michael Dorstewitz's Reports — More Here.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.