by Brianna Lyman
NBC’s Kristen Welker asked President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday if he still planned to end birthright citizenship. Trump affirmed his plans. But the way Welker deliberately misrepresented the amendment reveals not only a glaring need for clarification from Congress or the Supreme Court about whether children born to illegal aliens are citizens but the dangers of a press who are willing to craft law by word of mouth.
“You promised to end birthright citizenship on day one,” Welker said. “Is that still your plan?”
“Yeah, absolutely,” Trump responded.
Welker responded: “The 14th Amendment, though, says that, quote: ‘All persons born in the United States are citizens.’” Welker then asked if Trump will use “executive action” to circumvent the Constitution.
But that’s not exactly what the 14th Amendment says — though it may be what Welker and her other fellow Democrat propagandists wish it said. The media’s insistence on interpreting the 14th Amendment as a blanket guarantee of birthright citizenship fuels widespread confusion — but it’s deliberate. Take for example, that Politico’s Mia McCarthy reported Trump would have to “go around the 14th Amendment” to end birthright citizenship. CNN’s Daniel Dale wrote that the 14th Amendment says “someone born in the U.S. is granted automatic citizenship even if their parents are not citizens.”
Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that.
What the 14th Amendment actually says is:
“All 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.”
As Elad Hakim wrote in these pages, “While opponents to Trump’s proposed action [to end birthright citizenship] opine that the constitutional language is cut and dry, this might not necessarily be the case.”
Welker and others left out the qualifying clause of the amendment, that is, the “subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” Sen Mike Lee, R-Utah, pointed out “Those words matter.”
“Congress has the power to define what it means to be born in the United States ‘and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,’” he said in a post on X. “While current law contains no such restriction, Congress could pass a law defining what it means to be born in the United States ‘and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,’ excluding prospectively from birthright citizenship individuals born in the U.S. to illegal aliens.”
1. @MeetThePress omits six words about birthright citizenship from the 14th Amendment
The omitted text is set off by asterisks:
“All persons born … in the United States, *and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,* shall be citizens of the United States”
Those words matter https://t.co/qVYld0O4og
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) December 8, 2024
Senators Debated This Exact Question
The 14th Amendment was adopted in 1868 to guarantee that formerly enslaved persons and their descendants would not be denied citizenship. It superseded the earlier Dred Scott decision, which denied citizenship to enslaved people. But while it was being considered, lawmakers debated exactly who would be affected by the amendment.
Sen. Jacob Howard, R-Mich., stated the amendment was not written to give citizenship to “persons born in the United States who are foreigners [or] aliens.”
“This amendment which I have offered is simply declaratory of what I regard as the law of the land already, that every person born within the limits of the United States, and subject to their jurisdictions, is by virtue of natural law and national law a citizen of the United States,” Howard said. “This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons.”
Howard also said the amendment “settles the great question of citizenship and removes all doubt as to what persons are or are not citizens of the United States.”
But as Michael Anton, a former and incoming Trump Administration official, and Jack Roth, Senior Fellow in American Politics at the Claremont Institute said, “The bedeviling citizenship question of the age was how to treat freedmen.”
Meanwhile Sen. Edgar Cowan, R-Penn., who opposed the 14th Amendment, said: “It is perfectly clear that the mere fact that a man is born in the country has not heretofore entitled him to the right to exercise political power.”
Cowan believed the Constitution should not grant birthright citizenship to children of aliens who “owe [the U.S.] no allegiance [and] who pretend to owe none” and to those who “trespass” into the United States.
Cowan further stated that while a foreigner is “to a certain extent” entitled “to the protection of the laws … he is not a citizen in the ordinary acceptation of the word.”
Similarly John C. Eastman, who clerked for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, argued in an op-ed that “When a British tourist visits the United States, he subjects himself to our laws as long as he remains within our borders. He must drive on the right side of the road, for example. He is subject to our partial, territorial jurisdiction, but he does not thereby subject himself to our complete, political jurisdiction.”
“The same is true for those who are in this country illegally. They are subject to our laws by their presence within our borders, but they are not subject to the more complete jurisdiction envisioned by the 14th Amendment as a precondition for automatic citizenship.”
The Supreme Court Has Yet To Explicitly Clarify
In 1884, the Supreme Court ruled in Elk v. Wilkins that John Elk, a Native American, was not a U.S. citizen and therefore could not vote despite living within the United State’s geographic boundaries because Elk owed allegiance to his tribe, not the United States.
The court would later rule in United States v. Wong Kim Ark that Wong Kim Ark, who was born to Chinese parents who were legally residing in the United States, was automatically a citizen.
But the Supreme Court has never explicitly ruled on the citizenship of children born to parents residing in the United States illegally.
Still, there are some who contend the question is already settled, such as Judge James Chiun-Yue Ho, who sits on the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Ho argues, in part, that the 1982 Supreme Court case of Plyler v. Doe “put to rest” the question. The case involved whether children who were not “legally admitted” into the United States had a right to public education. The court ruled in part that even persons in the United States illegally were “within the jurisdiction” of the states wherein they reside.
While the case did not explicitly address the issue, Ho argues this decision “put to rest” questions about the children born to illegal immigrants because “all nine justices agreed that the Equal Protection Clause protects legal and illegal aliens alike. And all nine reached that conclusion precisely because illegal aliens are ‘subject to the jurisdiction’ of the U.S., no less than legal aliens and U.S. citizens.”
What about Obamas Birth Certificate. Rosebud?
Poorly researched fake. His mom was a citizen so IMO the whole born in kenya thing moot.
Would squash the birth tourism racket and hop across the border drop an anchor kid on the taxpayers dime fun.
Interesting. Then I guess Congress could pass legislation defining down what “arms” are in relation to the Second Amendment.
The Right to Keep a Bear Arms comes right after Freedom of Speech and religion. Funny Bunny just Read It Please
Birthright citizenship is a Constitutional amendment, too—it’s just as official as the Second Amendment:
Read what you accurately quoted and subject to the Jurisidiction there of, illegals are not subjects to the jurisdiction of any but their own country, nor are they entitled to claim the constitution as their own just by getting across the border. They have no rights none zip nada zilch.
If they’re not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States when they’re here, then they are subject to no laws in our country, and the Federal government has no legal power to make them leave. Are you sure that that is the argument you want to go with?
They did not come legally, they began their unwelcomed stay breaking the law so I suppose your assumption is correct. As far as their removal, that is the will of the citizens, what we voted for, the Feds have their marching orders in this republic. Stop feeding, housing, educating and giving them medical care on our dime they may remove themselves. The real problem are the missing children several hundred thousand. Little Juan and Juanita must be rescued maybe re-homed if not claimed (with DNA proof). Lots of empty federal buildings can be set up as orphanages.
Children born here are citizens. The Constitution is clear on that point, whatever you feel “the will of the citizens” to be. If the citizens want to change that, they’ll need to repeal the Fourteenth Amendment. There’s a process to follow.
Actually, the Constitution is UNclear on that, as that is the opposite of what those who wrote the Amendment intended, as their quoted statements CLEARLY state.
They don’t pay taxes, they aren’t subject to military draft, they can’t vote (or shouldn’t).
I know that you’re only parroting the marching orders that your MAGA handlers are handing out, but you should examine the underlying concepts for once.
Sure Mikey as you parrot the child exploiters marching orders those of the human traffickers.
Your ignorance works for Big Brother the United Nations
A product of liberal propaganda and brain washing, he lost the war for his own autonomy long ago. Sucks in the CIA line from mockingbird media like mothers milk.
Granting citizenship to children born of people that have violated US immigration law is a tortured abuse of the 14th Amendment. It is clear it was never intended for that but is only an interpretation those who take pleasure in that which weakens the nation can read. Perhaps read the article and the statements from those actually crafting the Amendment.
Of course, it is difficult for leftists to accept that the 14th was solely intended to benefit the former slaves, since this is a sore spot with them.
There is no better time than after January 20th, 2025 for some state to sue that granting citizenship simply for being born of illegal immigrants (felons, if they had been previously deported and illegally re-entered) is not protected by the 14th Amendment and have it pushed to the Supreme Court. 6-3 would suffice to clear that up.
When Trump is re-installed as President he will set up the situation for a test case going to SCOTUS.
We will abide by THAT decision when it comes down.
The 1898 case that dems base their “anchor baby” policy on will be tested by SCOTUS.
Okay. But until that time, babies who are born here are citizens. The plain reading of the text and the Supreme Court precedent say they are. That’s nothing that can be undone with an Executive Order.
But until that time, babies who are born here are citizens.
And are those babies entitled to all the benefits given by the nation of their parent’s citizenship, i.e. France or Ireland?
The plain reading of the text and the Supreme Court precedent say they are.
Name the USSC case that makes that settled law.
The amendment is, itself, settled law until the Supreme Court steps in and says otherwise.
Tel me that you don’t know how the Constitution works without telling me that you don’t know how the Constitution works.
Like with student loans?
What just happens to those that ignore the SCOTUS?
Ccitizenship is not guaranteed, it can be stripped.
Student loans are not mentioned in the Constitution. Birthright citizenship is.
Damn I thought you were taking about the SC stepping in. Yo Vax brain try to follow your own spike protein damaged thoughts, on the torture of the 14th.
Niether is their anything about the Separation of Church and State nor is their anything about allowing for Illegal Imagration and unregulated Imgration. Bean Brain
Pretty plain.