The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other advocacy groups have asked a federal judge to block Donald Trump from enforcing new executive orders he signed last week in his latest attempt to restrict eligibility for birthright citizenship in the US.
In a Tuesday court filing, the groups called the US president’s new orders an improper attempt to evade the US supreme court’s 30 June rejection of his first, more sweeping bid to deny automatic citizenship to children born to undocumented immigrants and temporary foreign residents.
The supreme court said that Trump’s original executive order, issued the day he began his second White House term last year, violated the US constitution’s 14th amendment.
“Despite the supreme court’s clear direction, the president continues to claim for himself the power to identify categories of children whose citizenship he intends to deny,” the filing said. “The court should underscore that the government may not strip away class members’ citizenship through any executive orders or other similarly flawed assertions of executive power over birthright citizenship.”
A White House spokesperson said: “The Trump administration has always followed court orders. All actions taken by the president since the recent supreme court rulings are consistent with the holdings and analysis set forth by the court.”
Trump has long sought to dismantle birthright citizenship and has made the effort a central pillar of his second-term immigration crackdown, though he has thus far been unsuccessful.
He also lashed out at the supreme court on Thursday over what he called “a very unfortunate decision … concerning birthright”. He told reporters: “It was close, but a very, very unfortunate decision. So we’re making adjustments because it’s very unfair.”
His latest orders from 6 August seek to broaden the categories of children ineligible for automatic US citizenship and take particular aim at so-called “birth tourism”, in which people travel to the US to give birth and guarantee citizenship for the baby.
Historical exceptions to the citizenship clause of the 14th amendment have included children born in the US to foreign sovereigns and diplomats; children of occupying foreign forces; children born on foreign ships; and children of Indigenous Americans.
Tuesday’s filing in the federal court in Concord, New Hampshire, asks the presiding judge to clarify that Trump’s latest orders do not threaten the citizenship of children protected by an earlier injunction.
“President Trump may not like the fact that birthright citizenship is a constitutional right,” Cody Wofsy, deputy director of the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project, said in a statement. “That is really beside the point. It’s well past time for these illegal and cruel attacks on children’s citizenship to end.”
Reuters contributed reporting
