Hearing Wrap Up: Birth Tourism is an Abuse of the American Immigration System

WASHINGTON-The Task Force on Defending Constitutional Rights and Exposing Institutional Abuses held a hearing today on "Protecting American Citizenship: Confronting Birth Tourism." During the hearing, members scrutinized the prevalence of birth tourism schemes in the United States and investigated firms that have been exploiting birthright citizenship by explicitly marketing their maternity services to foreign expectant mothers to take advantage of the U.S. immigration system. Members also analyzed the national security threat birth tourism poses to the U.S. and how this scheme undermines U.S. sovereignty. One of the witnesses, Dr. Wladimir Lorenz, the founder and chief medical officer for Have My Baby Miami, invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination when questioned about his company promoting birth tourism to foreign nationals.

Key Takeaways:

Companies across the United States promote birth tourism to foreign nationals for profit.

• Dr. Steven A. Camarota, Director of Research at the Center for Immigration Studies, stated that "My analysis of the 2024 public use birth certificate records provided by CDC show about 8,700 births to foreign born mothers who provided an overseas address on the birth certificate application. Although some researchers have tried to use this information to estimate the scale of the problem, this is not really a valid approach because there is ample evidence that so-called birthing centers or birth houses in the United States, which have U.S. addresses, are where the mother stays after she's given birth. The addresses are provided on birth certificates so the mother can receive the birth records before she leaves, ensuring citizenship has been properly registered."
  
• Nearly 26,000 babies are born to women on tourist visas annually, and roughly 70,000 births are attributable to temporary visitors in 2023 alone.

• Dr. Wladimir Lorenz-the founder and chief medical officer for Have My Baby Miami-invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination when questioned about his company promoting birth tourism to foreign nationals, including whether he helped members of the Chinese Communist Party obtain U.S. citizenship.

Birth tourism is a threat to national security and undermines U.S. sovereignty.

• Dr. Camarota also noted that "Now birth tourism raises questions, too. I think about assimilation and even national security. Even the children of more run-of-the-mill illegal immigrants typically grow up in the United States, so they're much more likely to develop some attachment to the country. But because the children of birth tourists grow up outside of the United States are much less likely to develop this attachment. And yes, as American citizens, of course, though, they can still enter the United States anytime they want travel to and from the country without any prior screening. They can attend college. They can work at almost any job, even within the federal government, and they can access public benefits immediately. Further, only citizens can obtain a security clearance. So there is potentially a national security dimension to birth tourism. The children of birth tourists can also sponsor their parents for a green card once they reach adulthood, rewarding the very people who committed the visa fraud."

The Trump Administration has made numerous efforts to restrict birth tourism and exploitation of birthright citizenship by foreign nationals and profit-driven companies.

• Dr. Camarota concluded that "First, birth tourists can be prosecuted under 18 U.S.C., which criminalizes fraud and misuse of visa application and other documents. Getting convictions in this area would be a major deterrent, particularly of the birth tourism industry [and] those who run these birthing houses. Another issue to think about is at present, consular officers generally cannot even ask a tourist applicant if they are pregnant and intends to come to the United States to have a child. Every tourist must be asked this directly. If they lie, it makes prosecution a whole lot easier because right now they can say, well, I didn't intend for this to happen. But if you ask them, if [they are] coming here to have a child and they say, no, but they're using a birth tourist center and they have a child, once they as soon as they get here, it makes the case easier. As the President's recent executive order stated, citizenship is not a commodity to be acquired through calculated exploitation and invasion of immigration laws. Policy changes coupled with prosecutions can greatly reduce this problem."

The House Oversight Committee is investigating several entities that promote birth tourism to expose these practices and ensure accountability.

• In May 2026, House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) and Representative Brandon Gill (R-Texas), the Chairman of the Task Force on Defending Constitutional Rights and Exposing Institutional Abuses, sent four letters to U.S. entities and businesses that are engaged in and profit from birth tourism.

• These firms are exploiting birthright citizenship by explicitly marketing their maternity services to foreign expectant mothers who take advantage of the U.S. immigration system to give birth in the U.S., and give their child U.S. citizenship.

Member Highlights:

Task Force Chairman Brandon Gill (R-Texas) pressed Dr. Wladimir Lorentz, founder of Have My Baby in Miami, on whether his business facilitated birth tourism services, especially for Chinese Communist Party officials and international terrorist organizations. Dr. Lorentz pled the Fifth.

Task Force Chairman Gill: "Dr. Lorentz, you run a medical business, is that correct? Press the talk button, please, so I can hear you. You run a medical business, is that correct?"

Dr. Lorentz: "Yes."

Task Force Chairman Gill: "You do? Is it true that your business Have My Baby in Miami marketed itself to and facilitated the entry of foreign nationals seeking to come to the United States to give birth and obtain birthright citizenship for their children?"

Dr. Lorentz: "On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question on the grounds that a truthful answer may tend to incriminate me, and I invoke my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the United States."

Task Force Chairman Gill: "Witness invoked his Fifth Amendment. Right. I've got your website right here that you had spent quite a bit of time marketing, which suggests that you were in fact facilitating the entry of foreign nationals so that they could give birth and obtain citizenship for their children. This is Have My Baby in Miami's website. On the front page of it, the last line of the commentary states, 'Now, the dream of having a child in the United States is closer to reality than you ever imagined.' Is this your website, Dr. Lorenz?"

Dr. Lorentz: "On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question on the grounds that a truthful answer may incriminate me, and I invoke the rights under the Fifth Amendment to the United States."

[…]

Task Force Chairman Gill: "Your website says over 2,000 deliveries of international patients so far, so I think we can assume it's over 2000. The website continues; it's got a section for documentation, health insurance advising foreign nationals on how to obtain international health insurance, housing in the United States, even. It's quite thorough, Dr. Lorenz. This website isn't public anymore. What motivated you to take down, or at least substantially modify, this website for Have My Baby in Miami after we first wrote to you about birth tourism in May?"

Dr. Lorentz: "On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question on the grounds that a truthful answer may incriminate me, and I invoke my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution."

Task Force Chairman Gill: "Does your business help children of members of the Chinese Communist Party obtain American citizenship?"

Dr. Lorentz: "On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question on the grounds that a truthful answer may tend to incriminate me, and I invoke my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution."

Task Force Chairman Gill: "Have you ever facilitated the childbirth in America for a member of Tren de Aragua, MS-13, or any other narco-terrorist organization?"

Dr. Lorentz: "On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question on the grounds that a truthful answer may tend to incriminate me, and I invoke my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution."

House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) asked Dr. Camarota about how foreign nationals find out about birth tourism services and whether American taxpayers are footing the bill.

Chairman Comer: "How do people in other countries find out about birth tourism?"

Dr. Camarota: "Well, the fact is that the United States has, you know, one of the most, maybe not the most, but one of the most liberal or permissive citizenship laws that is known. So, and of course, these facilities that that arrange for the births they advertise."

Chairman Comer: "And how are they advertised? Are they advertised on social media? Are they advertised in newspapers?"

Dr. Camarota: "They are [everywhere] I've seen. It's social media, the web, maybe newspapers, but a whole lot of word of mouth, too."

Chairman Comer: "When the births happen in the United States, I would assume that many of the births happen without a method of payment, without private health insurance. How? Who pays for that? What's the cost to the hospitals or the taxpayers? I mean, somebody has to pay. I've had three children. It's very expensive. It is. My wife had three children. But who pays for this?"

Dr. Camarota: "Yeah. Sometimes it is the taxpayers. Remember, hospitals don't turn anyone away who needs urgent care or emergency."

Chairman Comer: "Should it be paid for by Medicaid?"

Dr. Camarota: "Yeah. There's a disproportionate share hospital program, and there might be charity at that hospital. Sometimes there could be self-pay, but the taxpayer is often getting stuck with the bill based on anecdotal evidence. But I don't know that we have any systematic evidence."

Chairman Comer: "So just on the childbirth part, these people that are promoting birth tourism, that are profiting from birth tourism. They're advertising in foreign countries for those illegals to come to the United States. And when they have their childbirth, the Medicaid program, our Medicaid program that we're trying to fight on this committee, the Republicans, not the Democrats, they don't care about waste, fraud, abuse. We're trying to prevent Medicaid payments to people that, that aren't citizens at the very least, among other things, among fraudsters and everything else. They're advertising people come over here, the hospitals, get them signed up on Medicaid, and it's paid for. So that's a huge cost to the American taxpayer. How many of these would you estimate are happening annually?"

Dr. Camarota: "It's certainly going to run into the millions of dollars, but it doesn't take much to do that if we're right. And there's 20 to 26,000 births, and even 10,000 of them are paid for by the taxpayer, however that's done. Then you're talking tens of millions of dollars because each birth is, as you rightly point out, expensive. So, this is another problem of birth tourism."

Rep. Michael Cloud (R-Texas) inquired about the countries that are taking advantage of birth tourism schemes and how that poses a threat to U.S. national security.

Rep. Cloud: "Could you talk about the fact [that] when it comes to birth tourism, I guess the thing that concerns me most is, is the countries that seem to be taking advantage of it most seem to be the countries that don't like us the most. What countries most taking advantage of this?"

Dr. Camarota: "Yeah, as far as we can tell. But remember, we don't have great data on this. It does look like, as you might guess, Russia and China, it looks like Turkey is big on it. There's some from Brazil, a smattering of other countries, some in Europe, some outside of Europe, some Latin American countries. But you're right, it looks like a base, but this is only based on news stories. And we all know news stories can be inaccurate or give a false impression. It looks like China and Russia and based on criminal prosecution."

Rep. Cloud: "As best as we can tell?"

Dr. Camarota: "Yeah, as best as we can tell."

Rep. Cloud: "Russia and China; China is definitely an adversary to this nation has worked in many ways to undermine us. We could spend a whole half an hour or hours actually on that. I am concerned…so what they're doing is they're basically taking a B1 or B2 visa, and they're coming over here and having a child and then going home and raising that child in their, you know, 'my neighborhood communist school.' That child's raised maybe comes here later, works in one of the research institutions and then through chain migration, they can then apply for their parents to become citizens as well. Is that roughly it?"

Dr. Camarota: "Yep, that's essentially true. The child can come back and maybe sponsor the parents. And I think the primary motive is at the individual level, there might be communist agents or something, but that's the main motive is they don't trust their own regime to confiscate their wealth, to treat them, and they want to have this possible escape valve, if not for themselves, their children. So that's generally what's going on. But with the cascading series of consequences for the United States."

Rep. Brian Jack (R-Ga.) asked about a potential influx of foreign nationals applying for tourist visas for the 2028 Olympic Games, and whether there were any realistic safeguards the federal government can take to differential between genuine tourists and those who want to participate in birth tourism.

Rep. Jack: "[With] the U.S. coming off of a very successful World Cup, while preparing to host the 2028 Olympics, B2 visa applications are expected to surge in the coming years. And I'm curious, are there any realistic safeguards to differentiate genuine tourists and individuals who wish to participate in birth tourism as we discussed today?"

Dr. Camarota: "Well, have we discussed it's against the law, but the way in which visas are administered at the consular level make it more difficult to weed people out and to prosecute them after the fact. But that could change, so we're not stuck with this issue. It's not hopeless. We can do some things on the ground where the rubber meets the road, and we should."

Rep. Jack: "What are some of the things we can do?"

Dr. Camarota: "Yeah, well, you could instruct consular officers that they can ask about pregnancy. They can ask about your intent to have a child in the United States. And we could adopt a rule that you don't get to come to the United States if you're pregnant for a tourist visa. We're not talking about a green card. We're talking about someone's going to come here and live. We're talking about someone who says, 'Look, I'm coming temporarily to your country. 'And we say, 'Okay, well, after you have the kid, you could come,' and we could ask those questions, and consular officers can do that. Even the, you know, when a person arrives at a port of entry, we can ask those questions and exclude those who do have [that intent]. Many countries do things like that. It's perfectly reasonable."

Click here to watch the hearing.