The Supreme Court Upheld Birthright Citizenship—but the Fight May Not Be Over

The Lede The Supreme Court Upheld Birthright Citizenship—but the Fight May Not Be Over The decision that rejected Donald Trump’s attempts to rewrite the Constitution was much too close.

Save this story Save this story Save this story“This is one of the most important decisions in the history of the Court,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in his dissent in Trump v. Barbara, on the meaning of birthright citizenship, “and in my judgment, the Court has made a serious mistake.” It’s a very good thing that Alito is so disappointed, because he’s right about the case’s importance. For the moment, Donald Trump’s attempt to rewrite the Constitution—which, as the Court recognized on Tuesday, in its final ruling of the year, grants birthright citizenship to almost anyone born in the United States—has failed. Trump had tried to decree, by executive order, that the children of mothers who had no legal status in the U.S., or whose status was legal but temporary, and whose fathers were neither citizens nor permanent legal residents at the time of their birth, would not be citizens. (The order had not yet gone into effect, due to the legal proceedings.) And Trump lost.

Barbara—which takes its name from the pseudonym of a mother whose baby might have been affected by Trump’s executive order—is a case worth celebrating. The majority opinion, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, contains soaring language about the commitment that the Fourteenth Amendment makes to babies born in this country. “We keep that promise today,” the opinion says. But only five Justices out of nine signed on as promise-keepers: Roberts, Amy Coney Barrett, Elena Kagan, Ketanji Brown Jackson, and Sonia Sotomayor. Alito was not alone, and neither, on this issue, is Trump.