Supreme Court justices struck a skeptical tone Wednesday morning as they listened to the Trump administration argue its legal justification for the president’s bid to limit birthright citizenship guarantees for the children of undocumented immigrants.
President Donald Trump is watching from inside the courtroom as justices question U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer, who is arguing on behalf of the administration. Sauer is arguing that specific language in the 14th amendment means parents of children born in the U.S. must be domiciled in the United States and demonstrate allegiance to it in order for their children to be granted citizenship.
Domicile, the legal term for the place where an individual maintains a permanent home, is at the heart of Sauer’s argument. At issue is the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” in the 14th Amendment, which the solicitor general has based his domicile argument upon.
But Sauer has faced pushback from the court’s key conservative justices, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Neil Gorsuch, as well as the other justices.
Roberts said the Trump administration is using “very quirky” arguments and “narrow exceptions” to argue that swaths of people who live in the U.S. should be barred from automatic birthright citizenship.
“I think even your brief concedes that the position you’re taking now is a revisionist one with respect to a substantial part of our history,” Justice Elena Kagan said.
The case, Trump v. Barbara, centers on the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment, which has long been understood to confer citizenship to almost all individuals born on U.S. soil: “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.”
Shortly after returning to the White House last year, Trump signed an executive order seeking to end that guarantee. The justices will weigh whether the executive order complies with the federal statute that codified that clause.
Trump’s presence at the court is significant. He will be the first known sitting U.S. president to attend oral arguments before the high court, according to the Supreme Court Historical Society. The president has railed against the nine Supreme Court justices for ruling against his aggressive tariff agenda. Trump has slammed the justices on social media over the February tariff ruling and called on them to uphold his birthright citizenship order. A long line of hopeful spectators began amassing outside the court on Tuesday evening, hours before the arguments were expected to begin. Fallon Gallagher contributed to this report.
Sydney Carruth is a breaking news reporter covering national politics and policy for MS NOW. You can send her tips from a non-work device on Signal at SydneyCarruth.46 or follow her work on X and Bluesky. Recommended
