Trump's 'hero' justice offers roadmap after Supreme Court rejects birthright order
President Donald Trump lost his Supreme Court bid to restrict birthright citizenship through executive order, but one of his own appointees may have handed Republicans a blueprint for pursuing much...
By Fox News · Fox News
President Donald Trump lost his Supreme Court bid to restrict birthright citizenship through executive order, but one of his own appointees may have handed Republicans a blueprint for pursuing much of the same goal through Congress. Voting with the 6-3 majority, Justice Brett Kavanaugh agreed that Executive Order 14160, which restricts automatic citizenship to people born to U.S. citizens or permanent residents, couldn't take effect. But in a concurring opinion, he also pointed to a different path forward. Kavanaugh argued the court should have resolved the case under federal law rather than the Constitution, laying out a potential legislative path for Congress to pursue changes to birthright citizenship. Congress first wrote the 14th Amendment's birthright citizenship language into federal law in 1940, then carried it over into the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. Because Congress adopted that language after the Supreme Court's landmark 1898 decision in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, which established that most people born in the United States automatically become U.S. citizens, Kavanaugh said lawmakers effectively incorporated the court's interpretation into federal statute. TRUMP SUFFERS MAJOR SUPREME COURT DEFEAT AS JUSTICES UPHOLD BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP Kavanaugh said Trump couldn't use an executive order to change a law Congress had already passed, but instead suggested Congress could rewrite the law to limit birthright citizenship for children born to parents who are in the country illegally or temporarily. "Congress could — consistent with the Fourteenth Amendment—amend §1401(a) or otherwise enact new legislation establishing exceptions to birthright citizenship for children born to foreign citizens unlawfully or temporarily in the country," he wrote. ALITO WARNS SUPREME COURT MADE 'SERIOUS MISTAKE' THAT COULD HAVE NATIONAL SECURITY CONSEQUENCES Kavanaugh argued that large-scale illegal immigration and modern international travel have created circum…