Trump DOJ Pushes SCOTUS to Disregard Constitution, End Birthright Citizenship

By Yunior Rivas

Tanjam Jacobson, of Silver Spring, Md., holds a sign saying “Citizenship is a Birthright,” Thursday, May 15, 2025, outside the Supreme Court in Washington. Jacobson is a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in England of Indian descent, and her son was born here. “This is something that really matters,” says Jacobson, “it’s so wrong against the constitution [to take away birthright citizenship].” (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

The Department of Justice submitted a sweeping petition to the U.S. Supreme Court late Friday, asking the justices to uphold President Donald Trump’s controversial executive order that would deny birthright citizenship to children born in the United States, if neither parent is a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident. The filing explicitly challenges a centuries-old constitutional principle.

Lower courts have already blocked the order as unconstitutional, but Trump is betting on the Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority to roll back the universal principle, established in 1868 and reaffirmed in the landmark 1898 case United States v. Wong Kim Ark, that anyone born on U.S. soil is a citizen, with extremely limited exceptions.

“The Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted to grant citizenship to newly freed slaves and their children — not to the children of temporary visitors or illegal aliens,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in the petition. “The mistaken view that birth on U.S. territory confers citizenship on anyone subject to the regulatory reach of U.S. law became pervasive, with destructive consequences.”

The government is pressing the court to take the case quickly, claiming urgent national interests.

“The issues in this petition are unquestionably cert-worthy,” the petition adds. “The government has a compelling interest in ensuring that American citizenship — the privilege that allows us to choose our political leaders — is granted only to those who are lawfully entitled to it.”

The petition heavily leans on anti-immigrant fears, insisting the 14th Amendment itself “operates as a powerful incentive for illegal migration” and has “spawned an industry of modern ‘birth tourism.”

In July, Judge Joseph Laplante, appointed by former President George W. Bush, issued a class-wide injunction stopping Trump’s order from taking effect, warning that it “contradicts the text of the Fourteenth Amendment and the century-old untouched precedent that interprets it.” Around the same time, the Ninth Circuit also ruled that Trump’s executive order “is invalid because it contradicts the plain language” of the 14th Amendment.

The Trump administration is pleading with the Supreme Court to vacate those injunctions and let the order take effect — even while the merits of the dispute are still being litigated.

Ending birthright citizenship has long been a rallying cry of Trump’s anti-immigrant agenda. In Trump’s telling, the 14th Amendment is no longer a cornerstone of equal rights, but a loophole to be closed.