Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free
Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the world
A federal judge has blocked Donald Trump’s executive order denying US citizenship to children born in the country to illegal immigrants, addressing immigration pressure as a priority for his second presidential term.
John Coughenour, US district judge in Washington state, on Thursday called this policy “unconstitutional”, while issuing a temporary order blocking the president’s ban, according to media reports.
The decision comes from a lawsuit filed Tuesday by four Democratic state attorneys general led by Washington state — one of several legal challenges that were quickly mounted against the order. Trump was signed on Monday, hours after he was sworn in as president.
Coughenour’s decision marks the first legislative setback for the Trump administration just three days after returning to the White House. A wave of executive orders, many of which the president has signed, are focused on them immigration – started intense and drawn-out legal battles.
Democratic state attorneys general and civil rights groups this week filed separate lawsuits to overturn the birthright ban, all alleging similar violations of the Fourteenth Amendment, which states that “ all persons born or naturalized in the United States. . . are citizens of the United States”.
The Washington attorney general’s office said: “If allowed to stand, the illegal and un-American order would cause thousands of Washington infants and children to lose their ability to participate fully and fairly in American society as citizens, regardless of the Constitution’s guarantee of their citizenship.”
Oregon, Arizona and Illinois joined the lawsuit.
Instead, Trump’s order argued that the Fourteenth Amendment does not “extend citizenship to all persons born” in the US.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Earlier this week, it said the cases were part of the “leftist opposition” and the administration would face them in court.
The Justice Department said in a statement Wednesday that the order is “an important part of President Trump’s recent actions, consistent with his significant immigration authority, to address this nation’s dysfunctional immigration system.” and the ongoing crisis. the southern border“.
