On Friday, the Supreme Court furthered birthright citizenship’s defense with a tight 5-4 ruling. They chose not to review lower court injunctions tied to an executive order issued by the Trump administration. The court had struck this down 6-3, paving the way for challenges to birthright citizenship to move forward. This litigation and this judicial decision represent a watershed moment in the historical and present-day struggle over immigration and citizenship in the U.S.
Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who wrote for the majority, made a powerful argument in their favor. She concluded with a very important note that federal courts cannot have broad supervision over the Executive Branch. Instead, they should be focused on adjudicating individual cases and controversies consistent with the limited jurisdiction provided for by Congress. The majority’s decision opens the floodgates for the Trump administration. Their goal was to upend decades of settled U.S. citizenship principles, and at the very least, the bedrock of U.S. citizenship: birthright citizenship.
This is the culmination of three individual lawsuits brought against Trump’s attempted citizenship order. Federal district court judges had granted injunctions against the executive order, asserting it threatened the longstanding principle of birthright citizenship. This principle is the reason why anyone who is born on U.S. soil automatically gets citizenship. In fact, it’s been constitutionally required since the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868.
In her dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor criticized the ruling, stating, “ratified in 1868 [in] the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause, which enshrined birthright citizenship in the Constitution.” She lamented that this principle had been “accepted and respected by Congress, by the Executive, and by this Court. Until today.”
Sotomayor was joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson in voicing their dissent from the court’s troubling decision. She specifically explained the judicial “gamesmanship” that she observed from her more conservative colleagues. They let the Trump administration hijack procedural norms to erode well-settled rules of citizenship.
Barrett’s majority opinion suggested that universal injunctions almost certainly went beyond the equitable power conferred on federal courts by Congress. She stated, “When a court concludes that the Executive Branch has acted unlawfully, the answer is not for the court to exceed its power, too.” Implications for broad judicial remedies The ruling indicates a move against wide-ranging judicial remedies that would inhibit executive action.
The Supreme Court’s decision not only impacts current legal battles surrounding immigration but sets a precedent for future challenges to executive authority concerning citizenship laws. We know the conservative majority court is struggling with ideological splits. This decision could result in drastic changes to policies that affect millions of people born in the United States.