-Source-The Chicago Tribune-
President Donald Trump announced in an interview this week his plans to issue an executive order to end citizenship for children born in the country to noncitizen parents, another way to further reduce the flow of immigration.
But legal experts say Trump’s plan would run afoul of the U.S. Constitution’s separations of powers and would face tough legal challenges. Trump made the comments about his plan during an interview this week with the news organization Axios.
“It was always told to me that you needed a constitutional amendment. Guess what? You don’t,” Trump told Axios.
In Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Twitter described Trump's plans as “election season catnip.”
“The President doesn’t have this authority, but he does have an interest in dividing the country and riling up his base. This is midterm election nonsense,” Emanuel wrote on Twitter.
But what could this mean for children whose parents aren’t citizens? Here are five things to know about citizenship in the United States:
1. What part of the U.S. Constitution grants citizenship to people born here?
The 14th Amendment grants citizenship to everyone born or naturalized in the United States. The amendment was ratified July 9, 1868, and also included citizenship for recently freed slaves.
The amendment was part of the country’s Reconstruction era, and it was in response to Southern states that were passing laws limiting the rights of former slaves, according to Tulane University Law School. But the 14th Amendment didn’t grant the right to citizenship to all. Native Americans were not considered citizens until 1924 when the Indian Citizenship Act was passed.
2. What legal hurdles could the executive order face?
The president doesn’t have the authority to amend the Constitution, but Trump could argue that his order is giving instructions on how to interpret the Constitution rather than changing it, said William Baude, a law professor at the University of Chicago Law School. Read more