Trump's bid to restrict birthright citizenship rejected

The US Supreme Court has rejected President Donald Trump's attempt to restrict birthright citizenship in the United States - a right long woven into the fabric of American society - scuttling one of his top priorities in his crackdown on immigration.

The 6-3 ruling marked the second time this year that the court has invalidated a major initiative of the US president, following its February decision to strike down his sweeping global tariffs.

The justices upheld a lower court's decision that blocked Mr Trump's executive order directing US agencies not to recognise the citizenship of children born in the United States if neither parent is an American citizen or legal permanent resident, also called a "green card" holder.

Challengers to Mr Trump's order argued that it violates language in the US Constitution's 14th Amendment that confers citizenship to those born in the United States who are "subject to the jurisdiction thereof".

Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts, who authored the decision, said Mr Trump's directive violates language in the US Constitution's 14th Amendment that guarantees citizenship to virtually anyone born in the United States, with a few narrow exceptions.

"Citizenship, then and now, was the right to have rights - to freely participate in our political community," adding that the authors of the 14th Amendment extended that promise to every free-born person in the land.

"We keep that promise today," Chief Justice Roberts wrote.

Mr Trump condemned the Supreme Court ruling, calling on the Republican-controlled Congress to help enact one of his signature anti-immigration plans.

"The Supreme Court upheld Birthright Citizenship, which is too bad for our Country, but we can easily make it up in Congress through Legislation," Mr Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

Mr Trump, who has repeatedly tested the limits of presidential power in domestic and foreign policy, issued the order last year on his first day back in office as part of a suite of policies to crack down on legal and illegal immigration.

Critics have accused the Republican president of racial and religious discrimination in his approach to immigration.

The challengers said the Supreme Court already had settled the question of birthright citizenship in an 1898 case called United States v Wong Kim Ark, which recognized that the 14th Amendment grants citizenship by birth on US soil, including to the children of foreign nationals.

Chief Justice Roberts pointed to that 1898 ruling.

"Not surprisingly, then, in the 128 years since, we have repeatedly understood the rule of Wong Kim Ark to guarantee citizenship to all children born in the United States and subject to its power," Chief Justice Roberts wrote.

"We see no reason to depart from that view today."

Chief Justice Roberts said there was "scant evidence" to support Mr Trump administration's "dramatically revisionist view" of how to interpret the citizenship language of the 14th Amendment to limit birthright citizenship.

"If Congress intended to limit American citizenship to the children of those domiciled in the United States, nothing in the succinct language of the Citizenship Clause conveyed that design," Chief Justice Roberts wrote.

Conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh agreed with the ruling to reject Mr Trump's directive, but disagreed with the rationale.

He said in a concurring opinion that the order contravenes a separate federal law codifying birthright citizenship rights but not the 14th Amendment itself.

The Supreme Court weighed in on what it means to be an American citizen just ahead of the 4 July holiday when the United States marks the 250th anniversary of its founding.

Ahead of the ruling, some experts had estimated that Trump's directive could affect the legal status of as many as 250,000 ‌babies born each year and could require the families of millions more to prove the citizenship status of their newborns.

Challenge involved class-action lawsuit by New Hampshire parents and children

The legal challenge to Mr Trump's directive considered by the Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, involved a class-action lawsuit filed in New Hampshire by parents and children whose citizenship was threatened by the directive.

The 14th Amendment has long been interpreted as guaranteeing citizenship for babies born in the United States, with only narrow exceptions such as the children of foreign diplomats or members of an enemy occupying force.

The provision at issue, known as the Citizenship Clause, states: "All persons born or naturalised in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside."

The administration has asserted that the phrase "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" means that being born in the United States is not enough for citizenship, and excludes the babies of immigrants who are in the country illegally or whose presence is lawful but temporary, such as university students or those on work visas.

Citizenship is granted only to the children of those whose "primary allegiance" is to the United States, including citizens and permanent residents, the administration has argued. Such allegiance is established through "lawful domicile," which lawyers for the administration define as "lawful, permanent residence within a nation, with intent to remain".

When the Supreme Court considered the case on 1 April, Mr Trump made history as the first sitting president to attend arguments before the top US judicial body, though he left midway through, not long after the lawyer arguing against the administration had begun.

During the arguments, US Solicitor General D John Sauer, representing the administration, said the promise of citizenship for virtually any baby born on US soil has spawned what he called a sprawling industry of "birth tourism".

Mr Sauer said that "uncounted thousands of foreigners from potentially hostile nations have flocked to give birth in the United States in recent decades" to secure citizenship for their children.

Asked to explain how serious an issue "birth tourism" has become, Mr Sauer primarily cited media reports and conceded that "no one knows for sure".

Trump administration claimed 1898 precedent supported order

The 14th Amendment was ratified in 1868 in the aftermath of the Civil War of 1861 to 1865 that ended slavery in the United States, and overturned a notorious 1857 Supreme Court decision that had declared that people of African descent could never be US citizens.

During arguments, Mr Sauer described what he saw as the limited purpose of the 14th Amendment Citizenship Clause, saying it was adopted "to grant citizenship to the newly freed slaves and their children, whose allegiance to the United States had been established by generations of domicile here".

The Trump administration contended that the 1898 precedent supported Mr Trump's order because, according to the court's ruling in that case, at the time of his birth, Wong Kim Ark's parents had permanent domicile and residence in the United States.

Some of the justices pushed back on that during arguments, with conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch telling Mr Sauer: "Well, I'm not sure how much you want to rely on Wong Kim Ark."

Mr Trump for years had threatened to limit who qualifies for citizenship at birth.

Mr Trump wrote on social media last year: "Birthright Citizenship was not meant for people taking vacations to become permanent Citizens of the United States of America, and bringing their families with them, all the time laughing at the 'SUCKERS' that we are!"

"But the drug cartels love it! We are, for the sake of being politically correct, a STUPID Country but, in actuality, this is the exact opposite of being politically correct, and it is yet another point that leads to the dysfunction of America," Trump wrote.

Concord, New Hampshire-based US District Judge Joseph Laplante in July 2025 let the challenge to Mr Trump's order by the plaintiffs in the case before him proceed as a class, thus allowing the policy to be blocked nationwide.