US President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that his administration would appeal a federal judge’s decision temporarily blocking his attempt to restrict birthright citizenship.
“Obviously, we will appeal it,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, responding to a ruling by Washington state District Judge John Coughenour. The judge deemed Trump’s executive order “blatantly unconstitutional.”
The ruling imposes a 14-day stay on the enforcement of one of Trump’s most controversial executive actions, signed shortly after his second-term inauguration.
“This is a blatantly unconstitutional order,” Judge Coughenour said during the hearing. “I’ve been on the bench for over four decades, and I can’t recall a case where the issue was as clear as this one.”
Appointed by Republican President Ronald Reagan, Coughenour was critical of the Justice Department’s argument in defense of the order. “Frankly, I have difficulty understanding how a member of the bar could state unequivocally that this is a constitutional order,” Coughenour remarked. “It just boggles my mind.”
In response, Trump reiterated that his administration would appeal the ruling, while the Department of Justice committed to defending the executive order. A department spokesperson argued that the order “correctly interprets” the US Constitution and emphasized their intent to present a full legal argument to both the court and the public.
Birthright citizenship, guaranteed by the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution, states that anyone born on US soil is automatically a citizen. The amendment reads: “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.”
Trump’s executive order challenged this by asserting that individuals in the US illegally, or those on temporary visas, are not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the country and therefore should be excluded from automatic citizenship.
The ruling comes after multiple lawsuits filed by 22 states, two cities, and various civil rights groups, many of which praised the decision.
“No president can change the Constitution on a whim, and today’s decision affirms that,” said Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes. “This is the first of many wins as we fight executive overreach and any illegal actions the new administration may take.”
Washington Attorney General Nick Brown described Trump’s order as “un-American,” emphasizing that birthright citizenship “cannot be conditioned on one’s race, ethnicity, or where their parents came from.”
Trump had anticipated legal challenges to his executive order, acknowledging that it was likely to face opposition. He has repeatedly and incorrectly claimed that the US is the only country with birthright citizenship, although more than 30 nations—including Canada and Mexico—also have such policies.
Opponents of the order argue that the 14th Amendment, ratified in 1868 after the Civil War, has been settled law for over a century. They point to the 1898 US Supreme Court case United States v. Wong Kim Ark, in which the Court ruled that children born in the US to immigrant parents, including Wong, a Chinese-American man, could not be denied citizenship.
AFP
