Some of the SCOTUS justices including Trump appointee Justice Amy Barrett suggested that figuring out which babies were born to legal citizens versus illegal trespassers would be a "mess" to figure out. Yet it doesn't seem to be complicated for the vast majority of the world where there there is NO BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP. Nor should adjudication of U.S. Constitutional principles be influenced by how "messy" it would be to enforce. Good Lawd.
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From The Hill:
"Supreme CourtJustice Amy Coney Barretton Wednesday questioned Solicitor General D. John Sauer on what she dubbed the potentially “messy” applications of President Trump’s executive order on birthright citizenship.
“I can imagine it being messy on some applications,” Barrett told Sauer, regarding Trump’s Day 1 executive order limiting birthright citizenship to those born in the U.S. and with at least one parent with citizenship or permanent legal status.
“So, what would you do with what the common law called foundlings?” she continued, referring to abandoned infants. “The thing about this is, and then you have to adjudicate, if you’re looking at parents, and if you’re looking at parents’ domicile, then you have to adjudicate both residents and intent to stay. What if you don’t know who the parents are?”
Sauer replied, “I think there are marginal cases. That one, I think, has the benefit of being addressed” in Section 1401(f), which states that a child of “unknown parentage” who is found in the U.S. while under the age of five is granted citizenship until it is “shown” prior to them turning 21 that they were not born in the U.S.
But Barrett cut Sauer off while he referenced that statute, saying, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, but what about the Constitution?” The justice, a Trump appointee to the high court, went on to note the practical difficulty of applying the executive order.
“How would it work? How would you adjudicate these cases? You’re not gonna know at the time of birth, for some people, whether they have the intent to stay or not,” Barrett said.
“Including U.S. citizens, by the way,” she continued. “I mean, what if you have someone who is living in Norway with their husband and family, but is still a U.S. citizen, comes home and has her child here and goes back? How do we know whether the child is a U.S. citizen because the parent didn’t have an intent to stay?”
Sauer replied, “I make two points, one practical, one legal. The practical point is under the terms of this executive order, you don’t have to, because the executive order turns on objectively verifiable things, which is immigration status. Are you lawfully present, but temporarily present, or do you have an illegal status? So taking evidence, so to speak, under subjective attempt wouldn’t be done.
The solicitor general also said that federal guidance that the administration issued “provides, I think, very, very clear objective, verifiable approaches” to carrying out the executive order…"
https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/5811674-barrett-supreme-court-birthright-citizenship
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From CSPAN:
Justice Ketanji Brown Jacksonon Wednesday pressed Solicitor General D. John Sauer on his argument that citizenship at birth depends on whether parents are “domiciled” in the United States, questioning how such a standard would be applied in practice.
“How does this work? Are you suggesting that when a baby is born, people have to have documents, present documents? Is this happening in the delivery room? How are we determining when or whether a newborn child is a citizen of the United States?” she asked.
“So are we bringing pregnant women in for depositions? What? What are we doing to figure this out?” she added.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DWmdH2dkZDG/
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