Washington DC: US President Donald Trump has signed a new executive order aimed at tightening rules surrounding birthright citizenship, focusing on individuals who allegedly travel to the United States on tourist visas with the intention of giving birth.
Announcing the move at the White House, Trump argued that the existing interpretation of birthright citizenship has been misused and said his administration is taking steps to address what it considers an unfair practice.
According to senior White House adviser Stephen Miller, the order is designed to restrict automatic citizenship benefits for children born under specific circumstances. He said the measure would also cover additional categories of foreign nationals, including individuals linked to organisations designated as terrorist groups and certain people acting on behalf of foreign governments.
The latest directive follows previous attempts by the Trump administration to narrow the scope of birthright citizenship. Earlier efforts sought to deny automatic US citizenship to children born to parents who were either in the country illegally or staying on temporary visas.
Those measures, however, were blocked by lower courts, which held that the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees citizenship to nearly everyone born on American soil. The US Supreme Court also declined to uphold Trump’s earlier attempt, a decision the President has publicly criticised.
Birthright citizenship is rooted in the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment, which states that all persons born or naturalised in the United States and subject to its jurisdiction are US citizens. Existing immigration law already allows consular officials to deny visas if they believe an applicant’s primary purpose for travelling is to give birth in the country.
The executive order forms part of the Trump administration’s broader immigration agenda, which includes stricter border controls, expanded deportation efforts, and measures to reduce pathways for undocumented migration. The latest move is expected to face legal scrutiny, with constitutional experts anticipating fresh court challenges over its implementation.
