US President Donald Trump has signed two executive orders aimed at further restricting birthright citizenship, including one expanding the categories of people deemed ineligible for automatic citizenship at birth and another banning so-called “birth tourism.”
Trump also criticised on Thursday a recent Supreme Court ruling on birthright citizenship, calling it “a very unfortunate decision.”
“We’re making adjustments because it’s very unfair,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office before signing the orders.
“This was done right after the Civil War. This was for the babies of slaves, and what’s happening now? People are building businesses around it … That’s not the way it was supposed to work,” referring to birthright citizenship, which is guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution.
The Supreme Court struck down Trump’s executive order in June seeking to end birthright citizenship, with Chief Justice John Roberts affirming that the 14th Amendment’s protections extend to all children born on American soil.
The 14th Amendment states: “All persons born or naturalised in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States.”
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