Trump faces lawsuit over push to limit birthright citizenship 

Washington, DC – Rights organisations have launched a legal challenge to United States President Donald Trump’s latest efforts to restrict which infants born in the country are automatically granted birthright citizenship.

The groups, which had successfully defeated Trump’s earlier efforts to more broadly end so-called birthright citizenship at the US Supreme Court, launched the latest challenge on Tuesday at a federal court in the US state of New Hampshire.

That came days after Trump signed two new executive orders on the subject, one of which sought to expand narrow categories within the US Constitution’s 14th Amendment that already deemed some individuals ineligible for automatic citizenship upon birth. The other order called on the heads of the Department of State and Homeland Security to take measures to stop the practice of mothers travelling to the US for the sole purpose of giving birth, known as “birth tourism”.

The groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Legal Defense Fund, Asian Law Caucus, and Democracy Defenders Fund, argued that the Supreme Court’s June decision striking down Trump’s previous attempt to restrict birthright citizenship precluded any “revision” of the current exceptions under both the US Constitution and previous Supreme Court rulings.

“The Supreme Court could not have been more clear: President Trump’s attempt to redefine who is an American citizen through executive action was unconstitutional,” said Amia Trigg, deputy director of litigation at the Legal Defense Fund.

“Now, the president is trying to double down on his illegal attack on this constitutional protection. We will not stand idly by as the executive branch blatantly ignores the court’s authority in its crusade against American children,” she said.

Trump’s White House deputy chief of staff for policy and the architect of his hardline immigration approach, Stephen Miller, had previously vowed a long-shot challenge to the Supreme Court’s June decision. However, the administration let the July deadline to ask the top court to reconsider its ruling pass in late July.

Lawyers for the administration had argued that birthright citizenship had been misinterpreted since the 1868 ratification of the 14th Amendment, claiming that the provision was meant to assure citizenship to the children of newly freed slaves, not anyone in the country.

The 6-3 ruling by the conservative-dominated Supreme Court countered that position, with Chief Justice John Roberts writing there was “scant evidence for this dramatically revisionist view”.

“The Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment extended that promise to ‘every free-born person in this land’,” he wrote. “We keep that promise today.”

Legal observers have called Trump’s latest efforts to restrict birthright citizenship a stress test of June’s Supreme Court ruling, although it was unclear if the court’s justices would eventually be open to hearing the case or if they would consider the matter already settled.

While six justices voted against the Trump administration, one, conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh, rejected the notion that the administration’s attempt was unconstitutional. Some supporters of Trump’s effort say that has sustained hope for success if a new case does reach the top court.

His executive order sought to broaden the current exceptions under the 14th Amendment, which bars babies of foreign diplomats or invading forces from automatically being granted citizenship. It instructed government agencies not to “issue documents recognising United States citizenship” to diplomatic staff living in the US,  the children of alleged members of “terrorist organisations”, people deemed to be taking part in a “commercial transaction” to assure a child is born in the US, and certain people born in US territories.

The renewed push comes as several Republicans have sought to highlight birthright citizenship ahead of the midterm elections in November, arguing the Supreme Court’s decision has turned the issue into a conservative rallying point.

It remains unclear if that approach will gain traction, with polls regularly showing wide support for the practice, even as other immigration issues prove more divisive.

In a statement, Aarti Kohli, executive director of the Asian Law Caucus, one of the groups challenging Trump’s latest effort, said the administration “is just throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks”.

“Immigrant communities know that our rights are on the line, especially when the government uses us as scapegoats,” she said. “The Trump administration already lost once, and it will lose again.”