Trump hails ‘giant win' as supreme court rules on his birthright citizenship order

Irish Times

14 hours ago

The
US
Supreme Court agreed on Friday to allow president
Donald Trump
to end birthright citizenship in some parts of the country, even as legal challenges to the constitutionality of the move proceed in other regions.
The 6:3 decision, which was written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett and split along ideological lines, is a major victory for Mr Trump, and may allow the reshaping, even temporarily, of how citizenship is granted in the US.
The order will not go into effect for 30 days, the justices said in their opinion, allowing its legality to be contested further.
Mr Trump has hailed the ruling a 'giant win' and is due to hold a news conference at the White House shortly.
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'GIANT WIN in the United States Supreme Court! Even the Birthright Citizenship Hoax has been, indirectly, hit hard,' he wrote in a post on Truth Social.
The justices also did not address the underlying constitutionality of the president's order to curtail birthright citizenship, potentially leaving that issue for another day.
The court's ruling appeared to upend the ability of single federal judges to freeze policies across the country, a powerful tool that has been used frequently in recent years to block policies instituted by
Democratic
and
Republican
administrations.
Justices across the ideological spectrum had been critical of these so-called nationwide injunctions, arguing they encouraged judge-shopping and improperly circumvented the political process by allowing one judge to halt a policy nationwide.
The surprise decision means that an executive order signed by Mr Trump ending the practice of extending citizenship to the children of unauthorised immigrants born in the US would be set to take effect in 30 days in the 28 states that have not challenged the measure.
The details of how the policy would be implemented were not immediately clear.
The ability of a single federal judge in one part of the country to pause a policy nationwide has been a major stumbling block for Mr Trump. These so-called nationwide injunctions are controversial judicial tools, and have prompted intense debate over their legality.
Federal trial judges have consistently ruled against the Trump administration, stymieing efforts to withhold funds from schools with diversity programs, to relocate transgender women in federal prisons and to remove deportation protections from hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan migrants.
The case before the justices arose from an executive order signed by Mr Trump on January 20th, the first day of his second term, that appeared to upend the principle known as birthright citizenship, which has been part of the American constitution for more than 150 years.
The announcement prompted immediate legal challenges from 22 Democratic-led states, immigrant advocacy organisations and pregnant women concerned their children might not automatically be granted citizenship. Within days, a federal judge in Seattle temporarily blocked the executive order.
'I've been on the bench for four decades. I can't remember another case where the question presented is as clear as this one is,' the Seattle judge said, calling Mr Trump's order 'blatantly unconstitutional.'
Federal judges in Maryland and Massachusetts also issued orders pausing the policy. All three judges extended their orders to the entire country, even to states that had not brought legal challenges.
On March 13th, the Trump administration filed an emergency application asking the justices to weigh whether such nationwide injunctions were legal.
The Supreme Court has never issued a ruling that squarely addresses nationwide injunctions. But justices across the ideological spectrum have expressed skepticism over them.
In an unusual move, the justices announced that they would hear oral arguments on the emergency application.
—
The New York Times
/ Reuters