SCOTUSblog by Amy Howe 9/26/2025
The Trump administration on Friday asked the Supreme Court to weigh in on the legality of President Donald Trump’s executive order seeking to end the guarantee of citizenship to virtually everyone born in the United States. In a pair of nearly identical filings, U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer urged the justices to review a ruling by a federal appeals court holding that the order violates the Constitution, as well as a similar decision by a federal judge in New Hampshire. Sauer told the court that “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.”
At issue in the case is the meaning of a provision of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which provides that “[a]ll 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.” The amendment was adopted to overrule the Supreme Court’s 1857 ruling in Dred Scott v. Sandford, holding that a Black person whose ancestors were brought to the United States and sold as enslaved persons was not entitled to any protection from the federal courts because he was not a U.S. citizen.
Four decades later, the Supreme Court considered the case of Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco to parents of Chinese descent. Writing for the six-justice majority, Justice Horace Gray explained that the 14th Amendment “affirms the ancient and fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the territory, in the allegiance and under the protection of the country, with the exceptions or qualifications (as old as the rule itself) of children of foreign sovereigns or their ministers, or born on foreign public ships, or of enemies within and during a hostile occupation of part of our territory, and with the single additional exception of children of members of the Indian tribes owing direct allegiance to their several tribes.”
The executive order that Trump signed on Jan. 20 would end birthright citizenship. Fulfilling a campaign pledge, the order provided that people born in the United States after Feb. 19, 2025, would not be entitled to U.S. citizenship if their parents are in the country illegally or temporarily.
A flurry of legal challenges followed, and federal judges around the country concluded that Trump’s order was likely unconstitutional. One such judge, Senior U.S. District Judge John Coughenour, barred the Trump administration from enforcing the executive order anywhere in the country – an order sometimes known as a “nationwide” or “universal” injunction – and called birthright citizenship “a fundamental constitutional right.”
More:
https://www.scotusblog.com/2025/09/trump-urges-supreme-court-to-decide-whether-to-end-birthright-citizenship/
