Attorney General Ford Challenges Unconstitutional Executive Order Ending Birthright Citizenship

Las Vegas, NV - Today, Attorney General Ford announced that he, along with 17 other states, the District of Columbia, and the City of San Francisco, is challenging President Donald Trump's executive order purporting to end birthright citizenship, an action that violates the constitutional rights to which all people born in the U.S. are entitled.

"President Trump's executive order is an unlawful action that would strip citizenship from a significant part of our country's population, including thousands of babies born in Nevada," said AG Ford. "The last time birthright citizenship was denied to Americans was in the 1857 Supreme Court case Dred Scott v. Sanford, a decision that denied birthright citizenship to all Americans of African descent, both enslaved and free. In response to this decision, following the Civil War, Congress passed the 14th Amendment, which guarantees citizenship to people born in the United States. The 14th Amendment's guarantee of birthright citizenship has been the law of the land since the mid-1800s. Birthright citizenship has been adjudicated and decided. We cannot allow this unilateral attack on the constitutional rights of Americans to succeed."

On Monday, Jan. 20, President Trump issued an executive order ending birthright citizenship, an action which violates the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution and Section 1401 of the Immigration and Nationality Act.

To stop the President's unlawful action, which violates the Constitution and will harm hundreds of thousands of Americans, AG Ford and the coalition are filing suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, seeking to invalidate the executive order and to enjoin any actions taken to implement it. The states request immediate relief to prevent the President's Order from taking effect through both a Temporary Restraining Order and a Preliminary Injunction.

As the Attorney General's filing today explains, birthright citizenship dates back centuries - including to pre-Civil War America. Although the Supreme Court's notorious decision in Dred Scott denied birthright citizenship to all Americans of African descent, including slaves and their descendants, the post-Civil War United States adopted the Fourteenth Amendment to protect citizenship for children born in the country. As the Attorney General's filing also explains, the U.S. Supreme Court has twice upheld birthright citizenship, regardless of the immigration status of the baby's parents.

Individuals who are stripped of their United States citizenship lose their most basic rights and will live under the threat of deportation. They will lose their ability obtain a Social Security number and, as they age, to work lawfully. They will lose their right to vote, serve on juries and run for office. They will lose eligibility for a wide range of federal benefits programs. Despite the Constitution's guarantee of citizenship, thousands of children will - for the first time - lose their ability to fully and fairly be a part of American society as a citizen with all its benefits and privileges.

In addition to harming hundreds of thousands of Nevada residents, the filing explains that today's order also significantly harms the States themselves. Among other things, this Order will cause the States to lose federal funding for programs that they administer, such as Medicaid, the Children's Health Insurance Program and foster care and adoption assistance programs, which all turn at least in part on the immigration status of the resident being served.

States will also be required - on no notice and at considerable expense - to immediately begin modifying their operation and administration of benefits programs to account for this change. This significantly burdens multiple State agencies that operate programs for the benefit of the States' residents. The filing explains that the States should not have to bear these dramatic costs while their case proceeds because the Order directly contradicts the language of the Constitution, the Immigration and Nationality Act and two U.S. Supreme Court decisions.

Jurisdictions joining AG Ford in today's filing include California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont, Wisconsin, Washington, D.C. and the City of San Francisco.

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