California AG Bonta sues Trump's executive order against birthright citizenship

California AG Rob Bonta jins challenge against Donald Trump's executive order.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta Tuesday filed a lawsuit challenging the Donald Trump's  unconstitutional executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship, which is guaranteed in the US Constitution.

"As home to more immigrants than any other state in the country, California has a vested interest in ensuring that the federal government recognizes the fundamental rights of the children of immigrants who are born in our state," Bonta said in a press conference announcing the lawsuit.

"As he so often did in his first term in office, the president once again overstepped his authority with this unconstitutional executive order."

As California's Attorney General, Bonta joins 17 other Democratic states, including New Jersey, Colorado and Massachusetts, and the cities of San Francisco and Washington D.C., in suing the Trump administration, a day after Donald Trump was sworn into office and issued the executive order.

“The President’s executive order attempting to rescind birthright citizenship is blatantly unconstitutional and quite frankly, un-American,” said Bonta, the first Filipino American to head the AG office.

FYI: A copy of the complaint can be found here.

“As home of Wong Kim Ark, a San Francisco native who fought – successfully – to have his US citizenship recognized, California condemns the President’s attempts to erase history and ignore 125 years of Supreme Court precedent," Bonta stated. "We are asking a court to immediately block this order from taking effect and ensure that the rights of American-born children impacted by this order remain in effect while litigation proceeds.

"The President has overstepped his authority by a mile with this order, and we will hold him accountable.”

The right to becoming a US citizen if born in the US is embedded in the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution. Specifically, it states that "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."

"From the beginning of our nation’s history, America followed the common law tradition that those born on U.S. soil are subject to its laws and are citizens by birth. Although the Supreme Court’s notorious decision in Dred Scott denied birthright citizenship to the descendants of enslaved people, the post-Civil War United States adopted the Fourteenth Amendment to protect citizenship for children born in the country," Bonta stated.

The US Supreme Court affirmed this constitutional right in 1898 when a San Francisco-born, Chinese American man was denied entry back into the United States after visiting relatives in China on the grounds that he was not a citizen. In United States v. Wong Kim Ark, the Supreme Court established that children born in the United States, including those born to immigrants, could not be denied citizenship.

Within hours of taking office, the President issued an executive order disregarding the US Constitution and this long-established precedent. The order directs federal agencies to prospectively deny the citizenship rights of American-born children whose parents are not lawful residents. The order instructs the Social Security Administration and Department of State, respectively, to cease issuing social security numbers and US passports to these children, and directs all federal agencies to treat these children as ineligible for any privilege, right, or benefit that is reserved by law to individuals who are US citizens.

If allowed to stand, the order would strip tens of thousands of children born each year of their ability to fully and fairly be a part of American society as rightful citizens, with all the benefits and privileges. These children would lose their most basic rights and be forced to live under the threat of deportation. They would lose eligibility for a wide range of federal benefits programs. They would lose their ability obtain a Social Security number and, as they age, to work lawfully. And they would lose their right to vote, serve on juries, and run for certain offices.

The executive order would also directly harm California and other states, causing them to risk federal funding for vital programs that they administer, such as Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program; these programs are conditioned on the citizenship and immigration status of the children they serve. In addition, states would be required — on little notice and at considerable expense — to immediately begin modifying their operation and administration of benefits programs to account for this change by February 19, when the order goes into effect.

In Tuesday’s filings, the attorneys general contend that Trump’s executive order is a flagrant violation of the Constitution and the Immigration and Nationality Act and would cause irreparable harm to the states and their residents. As such, the attorneys general seek a nationwide preliminary injunction to prevent the denial of the constitutional rights of tens of thousands of babies born each year in the US who otherwise would have been, and should be, citizens, including an estimated 24,500 children born in California annually, and the disruption vitally important public health and other federal benefit programs.

Attorney General Bonta is joined by the attorneys general of New Jersey, Massachusetts, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin, along with the City of San Francisco.

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