The Connecticut attorney general joined a lawsuit to block Donald Trump’s executive order to end birthright citizenship on Tuesday, Jan. 21, according to a press release from the attorney general’s office.
On Monday, Jan. 20, Trump signed 26 executive orders on his first day in office. Among them was an executive order that stated the government should no longer recognize the citizenship of those who were born in the U.S. “when that person’s mother was unlawfully present in the United States and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth” or when the mother was there lawfully but temporarily and the father was not a lawful permanent resident.
The 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution says “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” The executive order claims the amendment “has never been interpreted to extend citizenship universally to everyone born within the United States.”
“The Fourteenth Amendment has always excluded from birthright citizenship persons who were born in the United States but not ‘subject to the jurisdiction thereof,’” the order says.
The next day, Connecticut Attorney General William Tong filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts to invalidate the order as unconstitutional. California, Colorado, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin are all a part of the lawsuit, as well as the District of Columbia and the city of San Francisco.
The lawsuit states that birthright citizenship has been recognized and enshrined in American law and practice for well over 100 years, citing cases in which Congress, the executive branch and the Supreme Court all acknowledge that birthright citizenship extends to the children of noncitizens. According to the suit, Trump “has no authority to rewrite or nullify a constitutional amendment or duly enacted statute.”
The states of Arizona, Washington, Oregon and Illinois also sued Trump for the executive order. The judge in the suit issued a temporary restraining order against the order, declaring that no one could enforce the order until the court can consider the plaintiff’s request for a preliminary injunction. In the temporary restraining order decision, the judge ruled that states were “likely to suffer irreparable harm” if the executive order was enforced and that “there is a strong likelihood” the states would succeed in their argument that the order violates the 14th Amendment.
The press release from Tong said “this fight is personal” for him, as he became the first American citizen in his immediate family through birthright citizenship. He said eliminating birthright citizenship “will cause chaos across Connecticut and the United States.”
“This is a war on American families waged by a President with zero respect for our Constitution. We have sued, and I have every confidence we will win. The 14th Amendment says what it means, and it means what it says—if you are born on American soil, you are an American. Period. Full stop,” Tong said in the press release. “There is no legitimate legal debate on this question. But the fact that Trump is dead wrong will not prevent him from inflicting serious harm right now on American families like my own.”
The press release said that the executive order would strip thousands of children of the benefits of American citizenship and inflict unnecessary harm on the states themselves. Tong said his own life would not be possible without birthright citizenship.
“This is the core of the American dream, and part of the essential character of our nation. We knew this fight was coming, and we are prepared,” Tong said.