By Patricia Lopez / Bloomberg Opinion
On Tuesday, his first full day as president, Donald Trump attended an inaugural service at Washington National Cathedral. Episcopal Bishop Mariann Budde pleaded with the new president.
“In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now,” she said. The vast majority of immigrants are not criminals, Budde said, but pay taxes and are good neighbors.
Trump scarcely looked at her. Trump is eager for a fight over immigration and has been for years. He has made no secret of his desire to restrict entry to this country and he won both the Electoral College and the popular vote.
A flurry of executive orders signed shortly after his inauguration on Monday aim to do just that. Among the most chilling: an attempt to override the 14th Amendment, limit birthright citizenship, and create a subclass of children who were born here, but who, through a cruel trick of timing, are not Americans.
The executive order takes effect in less than a month. Babies born in the U.S. after that to undocumented parents would, Trump said, no longer be recognized by the federal government as U.S. citizens.
Altering birthright citizenship has been high on Trump’s agenda for years. Nevertheless, it is shocking to see the scope. The order not only includes undocumented immigrants, but also includes legal immigrants whose status is considered temporary.
Hundreds of thousands who entered the U.S. legally on student visas, the H-1B program for skilled foreign workers or through refugee programs such as Temporary Protected Status would be subject to the same restrictions. No permanent status, no American citizen children.
Yes, the H-1B program needs a major overhaul. So do other temporary programs. But this ugly, punitive approach is hardly the way.
Ultimately, of course, this will be a matter for the Supreme Court. Trump, his hubris notwithstanding, lacks the power to alter the 14th Amendment, which explicitly states that “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States.”
Intended to guarantee citizenship for newly freed slaves, the amendment has long been interpreted as establishing birthright citizenship. That principle was affirmed in U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark, the 1898 case of a Chinese American man born in San Francisco, but to Chinese citizens. The precedent set in that ruling has stood for well over a century.
Perhaps Trump thinks there is no way a Supreme Court with a conservative 6-3 majority — three of whom he appointed — would defy him on one of his signature obsessions. Maybe he thinks the longstanding precedent will matter little to the court that overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, robbing women of reproductive rights guaranteed by the Constitution for almost 50 years.
Or perhaps he expects to fail — as many legal scholars anticipate — but still feels the gambit gives him a talking point and another way to blame opponents for thwarting him.
Forces are already gathering to oppose him. Twenty-two Democratic-led states, including Washington state, are filing suit and injunctions will be sought. The American Civil Liberties Union has filed its own lawsuit.
They will be busy. The birthright citizenship ploy is just one part of Trump’s frontal assault on immigration. He has suspended the entire U.S. Refugee Resettlement Program, believing that Biden admitted far too many refugees. Another executive order requires a plan that assigns the Defense Department’s U.S. Northern Command to seal the borders. Other actions canceled thousands of appointments with asylum seekers and banned entry of Syrian refugees until further notice.
And although Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, said before Trump took office that the administration would prioritize the removal of criminals, on Monday Trump specifically broadened enforcement beyond that narrow charge and removed earlier guidelines against conducting raids in schools, hospitals, churches, shelters and more.
Trump clearly intends to wage a brutal campaign of “shock and awe” against immigrants, believing that the brutality itself sends the message to “keep out.” But more than immigrants will be brutalized as this unfolds.
After Bishop Budde’s plea to Trump went viral, Rep. Mike Collins, a Republican from Georgia, posted on X that “The person giving this sermon should be added to the deportation list.” Budde, for the record, was born in New Jersey.
Trump has never understood or believed that immigrants are part of what makes America exceptional. Each wave of immigration has made its contributions, creating a mosaic of cultures that enliven this nation and expose us to new ways and new thinking. Have there been rough spots? Certainly. Do we need immigration reforms? Undoubtedly. Many Americans are frustrated with levels that seem to be rising beyond this nation’s capacity to adapt. But this is not the thoughtful, humane reform many Americans seek.
I am a daughter of naturalized immigrants, and my father believed to his last day that this was the greatest country in the world and that his greatest gift to me was my American citizenship.
It saddens me to think that Trump’s America may well become a smaller, meaner place that turns its back on what makes this country truly great; its generous and welcoming spirit, constantly refreshed by the sweat and toil of newcomers seeking freedom.
Patricia Lopez is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering politics and policy. She is a former member of the editorial board at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, where she also worked as a senior political editor and reporter.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
