A pair of law professors from Georgetown Law School and the University of Minnesota dropped a bombshell on Democrats who have mocked President Donald Trump’s case to end birthright citizenship for illegal immigrants.
The professors penned an opinion piece for The New York Times that likely shocked the publication’s liberal readers, who were greeted with a headline that said, “Trump might have a case on birthright citizenship.”
As Constitutional experts have said, the original intention of birthright citizenship in the 14th Amendment was to give citizenship to the children of former slaves, not illegal immigrants. But in the century since, federal courts have leaned in on the amendment’s text to include all children born in the U.S., regardless of the legal status of their parents.
“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,” the Amendment says.
“When they finally consider this question, the justices will find that the case for Mr. Trump’s order is stronger than his critics realize,” the professors said in reference to a case that is likely to reach the U.S. Supreme Court.
When it comes to illegal immigrants, the Amendment gets tricky, they said in the piece.
“Has a citizen of another country who violated the laws of this country to gain entry and unlawfully remain here pledged obedience to the laws in exchange for the protection and benefit of those laws?” the professors said.
“Clearly, the parents are not enemies in the sense of an invading army, but they did not come in amity,” they said in reference to the legal definitions of citizenship. “They gave no obedience or allegiance to the country when they entered — one cannot give allegiance and promise to be bound by the laws through an act of defiance of those laws.”