US judge blocks Trump’s order curtailing birthright citizenship

SEATTLE – A federal judge in Seattle on Jan 23 blocked President Donald Trump’s administration from implementing an executive order

curtailing the right to automatic birthright citizenship

in the United States, calling it “blatantly unconstitutional”.

US District Judge John Coughenour issued a temporary restraining order at the urging of four Democratic-led states – Washington, Arizona, Illinois and Oregon – preventing the administration from enforcing the order. Mr Trump had signed the order on Jan 20, his first day back in office.

The judge, an appointee of Republican former president Ronald Reagan, dealt the first legal setback to the hardline policies on immigration that are a centrepiece of Mr Trump’s second term as president.

“Obviously we’ll appeal,” Mr Trump said of Judge Coughenour’s ruling. 

Mr Trump’s executive order had directed US agencies to refuse to recognise the citizenship of children born in the US if neither their mother nor father is a US citizen or legal permanent resident.

“I am having trouble understanding how a member of the bar could state unequivocally that this order is constitutional,” the judge told a US Justice Department lawyer defending Mr Trump’s order. “It just boggles my mind.”

The states argued that Mr Trump’s order violated the right enshrined in the citizenship clause of the US Constitution’s 14th Amendment that provides that anyone born in the US is a citizen.

“I’ve been on the bench for over four decades. I can’t remember another case where the question presented is as clear as this one. This is a blatantly unconstitutional order,” the judge said.

Judge Coughenour’s order, announced following a short hearing in a packed courtroom with other judges watching, prevents Mr Trump’s policy from being enforced nationwide for 14 days while the judge considers whether to issue a long-lasting preliminary injunction. He will hear arguments over whether to do so on Feb 6.

Under Mr Trump’s order, any children born in the United States after Feb 19 whose mother and father are not American citizens or lawful permanent residents would be subject to deportation and would be prevented from obtaining Social Security numbers, various government benefits and the ability as they get older to work lawfully.

“Under this order, babies being born today don’t count as US citizens,” Washington Assistant Attorney-General Lane Polozola, referring to Mr Trump’s policy, told the judge during the hearing.

Justice Department lawyer Brett Shumate argued that Mr Trump’s action was constitutional and called any judicial order blocking it “wildly inappropriate”. But before Mr Shumate had even finished responding to Mr Polozola’s argument, Judge Coughenour said he had signed the temporary restraining order.

‘Vigorously defend’

The Justice Department plans to file papers next week to urge the judge to not issue a longer injunction, Mr Shumate said. A Justice Department spokesperson said it plans to continue to “vigorously defend” Mr Trump’s order.

“We look forward to presenting a full merits argument to the court and to the American people, who are desperate to see our nation’s laws enforced,” the spokesperson said.

Washington Attorney-General Nick Brown, a Democrat, said he sees no reason to expect that the Justice Department would succeed in overturning Judge Coughenour’s ruling on appeal, even if the matter goes to the US Supreme Court, whose 6-3 conservative majority includes three justices appointed by Mr Trump.

“You are an American citizen if you were born on American soil – period,” Mr Brown said. “Nothing that the President can do will change that.”

More than 150,000 newborn children would be denied citizenship annually if Mr Trump’s order is allowed to stand, according to the Democratic-led states.

Several other lawsuits are also pending nationwide by civil rights groups and Democratic attorneys-general from 22 states, who call it a flagrant violation of the US Constitution.

Democratic state attorneys-general have said that the understanding of the Constitution’s citizenship clause was cemented 127 years ago when the US Supreme Court held that children born in the US to non-citizen parents are entitled to American citizenship.

The 14th Amendment was adopted in 1868 following the Civil War and overturned the Supreme Court’s notorious 1857 Dred Scott decision that had declared that the Constitution’s protections did not apply to enslaved black people.

In a brief filed late on Jan 22, the US Justice Department called the order an “integral part” of the President’s efforts “to address this nation’s broken immigration system and the ongoing crisis at the southern border”.

Thirty-six of Mr Trump’s Republican allies in the US House of Representatives on Jan 21 separately introduced legislation to restrict automatic citizenship to only children born to citizens or lawful permanent residents. REUTERS