A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that President Donald Trump’s order to end his birthright citizenship was unconstitutional and confirmed a low-court decision that blocked enforcement nationwide.
The ruling from a three-judge panel in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals comes after Trump’s plans were also blocked by federal judges in New Hampshire. This brings you one step closer to coming back soon before the Supreme Court.
The Ninth Circuit decision keeps the Trump administration a block that forces orders to deny citizenship on children born to people living in the United States either illegally or temporarily.
“The district court correctly concluded that the proposed interpretation of the executive order denying the citizenship of many people born in the United States is unconstitutional.
The 2-1 ruling concluded a decision from Seattle’s US District Judge John C. Cornor, denounced him for deterring Trump’s efforts to end birthright citizenship and defy the administration’s attempt to ignore the constitution for political interests.
The White House and the Department of Justice did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
Since then, the Supreme Court has restricted the powers of lower court judges to issue nationally affecting orders known as national injunctions.
However, a majority in the 9th Circuit found that the case falls into one of the exceptions opened by judges. The lawsuit was filed by a group of states who argued that national order was necessary to prevent the problems posed by birthright citizenship being the law of half of the country.
Judges Michael Hawkins and Ronald Gould, appointed by President Bill Clinton, concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion in issuing a universal injunction to provide full relief to the state.
Trump-appointed Judge Patrick Bumatay disagreed. He discovered that the state has no legal right to sue or standing. “We must approach the request for universal relief with sincere skepticism that the call to ‘complete relief’ is not a backdoor of a universal injunction,” he writes.
Bumatay did not weigh in on whether it was constitutional to end citizenship by nature.
The 14th Amendment citizenship clause states that all people born or naturalized in the United States and are subject to US jurisdiction are citizens.
Justice Department lawyers argue that the phrase “excludes US jurisdiction” in the amendment means that citizenship is not automatically awarded to a child based solely on the place of birth.
Washington, Arizona, Illinois and Oregon allegedly ignore the plain language of citizenship clauses and the landmark birthright citizenship case in which the Supreme Court ruled a child born in San Francisco to Chinese parents as citizens by giving birth in American soil.
Trump’s order argues that if a mother does not have legal immigration status or is legally temporarily in the country, children born in the United States are not citizens. At least nine lawsuits have been filed around the US, challenging the order
Associated Press writer Rebecca Boone contributed to the story.
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