President argues policy was intended for freed slaves, not children of immigrants, as Supreme Court prepares to hear challenge to executive order restricting automatic citizenship
President Donald Trump said on March 30 that the United States’ current birthright citizenship policy was originally created to grant citizenship to freed slaves and their children, not to children born to temporary visitors.
His remarks come as the Supreme Court prepares to hear Trump v. Barbara on April 1. The case centers on whether Executive Order 14160—excluding children of illegal immigrants and legal temporary visitors from automatically receiving U.S. citizenship at birth—is constitutional. The order has been blocked in lower courts.
“Birthright Citizenship is not about rich people from China, and the rest of the World, who want their children, and hundreds of thousands more, FOR PAY, to ridiculously become citizens of the United States of America,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“It is about the BABIES OF SLAVES!” he added.
In Trump v. Barbara, the federal government argues that the 14th Amendment’s citizenship clause, adopted in 1868, was intended to grant citizenship to former slaves and their children, not to the children of illegal immigrants or legal temporary visitors.
Since the Supreme Court’s 1898 decision in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, the federal government has recognized that nearly all individuals born in the United States are citizens at birth.
The citizenship clause states: “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 reference to Chinese nationals appears to relate to claims that some are using surrogacy and birth tourism to secure U.S. citizenship for their children, a practice he suggested could pose long-term national security risks.
“The World is getting rich selling citizenship to our Country, while at the same time laughing at how STUPID our U.S. Court System has become (TARIFFS!),” Trump wrote.
“Dumb Judges and Justices will not a great Country make!” he added.
On Feb. 20, the Supreme Court struck down many of Trump’s tariffs, ruling they violated an emergency powers law he had invoked. The tariffs had been enacted under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, with the court deciding 6–3 that the statute did not clearly authorize such measures.
Trump had argued the tariffs were necessary to curb the flow of illegal drugs and address “large and persistent” trade deficits with foreign nations.
Tariffs imposed under other legal authorities were not affected by the ruling.
