The US Supreme Court sent a 'troubling' signal to Donald Trump in Washington this week, according to a prominent legal analyst, after a closely divided ruling on birthright citizenship exposed how far nearly half the justices were prepared to entertain his immigration agenda even as they struck down his executive order.
The decision concerned Trump's effort to limit birthright citizenship, a principle rooted in the Fourteenth Amendment that automatically grants US citizenship to almost everyone born on American soil. Trump and his allies had invested significant political capital in challenging that long‑settled interpretation, arguing the Constitution allowed the government to narrow who counts as a citizen by birth. The court ultimately rejected his position but in a much narrower split than many legal observers had anticipated.
