WASHINGTON: A federal judge on Wednesday blocked Donald Trump’s attempt to restrict birthright citizenship in the United States in a blow to the president’s bid to end a right enshrined in the Constitution for more than a century.

US District Judge Deborah Boardman in Greenbelt sided with two immigrant rights groups and five pregnant women who argued that their children were at risk of being unconstitutionally denied US citizenship based on their parents’ immigration status.

The judge, an appointee of Trump’s Democratic predecessor Joe Biden, issued a nationwide preliminary injunction blocking Trump’s order from going into effect nationwide as planned on Feb 19.

“The denial of the precious right to citizenship will cause irreparable harm,” District Judge Deborah Boardman was reported as saying during the hearing at a Maryland court. She noted that Supreme Court precedent protects birthright citizenship, adding that Trump’s order “conflicts with the plain language of the 14th Amendment,” the Washington Post reported.

Judge sided with rights groups and pregnant women who argued their children were at risk of being denied US nationality

“No court in the country has ever endorsed the president’s interpretation,” she said. “This court will not be the first.” The injunction adds to a 14-day stay on enforcement of Trump’s executive order issued in January by a federal judge in Washington state.

Relief for Trump’s opponents

“Today, virtually every baby born on US soil is a US citizen upon birth,” Boardman said. “That is the law and tradition of our country. That law and tradition are and will remain the status quo pending the resolution of this case.” Boardman’s order provided longer-term relief to opponents of Trump’s policy than an earlier, 14-day pause imposed on Jan 23 by a Seattle-based federal judge.

That judge, John Coughenour, called Trump’s order “blatantly unconstitutional.” Coughenour is set on Thursday to consider whether to likewise issue a preliminary injunction that would remain in effect pending the resolution of the litigation.

Birthright citizenship is enshrined in the US Constitution under the 14th Amendment which decrees that anyone born on US soil is a citizen.

Trump’s order was premised on the idea that anyone in the United States illegally, or on a visa, was not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the country, and therefore excluded from this category.

Lawyers for the immigrant rights groups CASA and the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project argued that 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 United States is a citizen.

Their lawsuit is one of at least eight filed around the United States by Democratic state attorneys general, immigrants rights advocates and expectant mothers challenging Trump’s order.

They have cited an 1898 US Supreme Court ruling in the case of a Chinese-American man named Wong Kim Ark, who was denied reentry to the United States on the grounds that he was not a citizen. The court affirmed that children born in the United States, including those born to immigrants, could not be denied citizenship.

Published in Dawn, February 6th, 2025