Donald Trump's attempt to restrict birthright citizenship faces a decisive moment in Washington on Tuesday, when the US Supreme Court is expected to rule in Trump v. Barbara on his 2025 executive order limiting automatic citizenship for children of illegal immigrants and temporary visa holders. Yet even if the justices strike Trump's order down, Republicans in Congress are already advancing bills that could quietly achieve much the same result without the court's blessing.
Trump's order set out to reinterpret the 14th Amendment's guarantee of citizenship to those born in the United States and 'subject to the jurisdiction thereof,' a phrase that has long been read as encompassing almost everyone born on US soil. His allies argue that the clause should never have covered the children of those in the country unlawfully, or of visitors on short-term visas.
