SAN FRANCISCO – California Attorney General Rob Bonta on Jan. 21 filed a lawsuit challenging the Trump Administration’s unconstitutional executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship.

Under the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, all children born on U.S. soil are automatically granted U.S. citizenship and the rights and privileges that come with it. In 1898, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed this right in a case brought by Wong Kim Ark, a San Francisco-born Chinese American man who had been denied his re-entry rights after a trip abroad.

In the lawsuit, 18 state attorneys general – led by California, New Jersey, and Massachusetts – argue that Trump’s unprecedented executive order violates the 14th Amendment and Section 1401 of the Immigration and Nationality Act and should be immediately blocked from going into effect while litigation proceeds.

“The president’s executive order attempting to rescind birthright citizenship is blatantly unconstitutional and quite frankly, un-American,” said Bonta. “As the home of Wong Kim Ark, a San Francisco native who fought – successfully – to have his U.S. citizenship recognized, California condemns the president’s attempts to erase history and ignore 125 years of Supreme Court precedent.

“We are asking a court to immediately block this order from taking effect and ensure that the rights of American-born children impacted by this order remain in effect while litigation proceeds. The president has overstepped his authority by a mile with this order, and we will hold him accountable.”

From the beginning of the nation’s history, America followed the common-law tradition that those born on U.S. soil are subject to its laws and are citizens by birth. Although the Supreme Court’s notorious Dred Scott decision denied birthright citizenship to the descendants of slaves, the post-Civil War U.S. adopted the 14th Amendment to protect citizenship for children born in the country. The amendment’s Citizenship Clause explicitly promises that “[a]ll 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.”

The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed this constitutional right in 1898 when a San Francisco-born Chinese American man was denied entry back into the U.S. after visiting relatives in China on the grounds that he was not a citizen. In United States v. Wong Kim Ark, the Supreme Court established that children born in the U.S., including those born to immigrants, could not be denied citizenship.

Within hours of taking office, Trump issued an executive order disregarding the Constitution and this long-established precedent. The order directs federal agencies to prospectively deny the citizenship rights of American-born children whose parents are not lawful residents. The order instructs the Social Security Administration and Department of State, respectively, to cease issuing Social Security numbers and U.S. passports to these children, and directs all federal agencies to treat these children as ineligible for any privilege, right, or benefit that is reserved by law to individuals who are U.S. citizens.

If allowed to stand, the order would strip tens of thousands of children born each year of their ability to fully and fairly be a part of American society as rightful citizens, with all the benefits and privileges. These children would lose their most basic rights and be forced to live under the threat of deportation.

They would lose eligibility for a wide range of federal benefits programs. They would lose their ability obtain a Social Security number and, as they age, to work lawfully. And they would lose their right to vote, serve on juries, and run for certain offices.

The executive order would also directly harm California and other states, causing them to risk federal funding for vital programs that they administer, such as Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program; these programs are conditioned on the citizenship and immigration status of the children they serve.

In addition, states would be required — on little notice and at considerable expense — to immediately begin modifying their operation and administration of benefits programs to account for this change by Feb. 19, when the order goes into effect.

The attorneys general contend that Trump’s executive order is a flagrant violation of the Constitution and the Immigration and Nationality Act and would cause irreparable harm to the states and their residents. As such, the attorneys general seek a nationwide preliminary injunction to prevent the denial of the constitutional rights of tens of thousands of babies born each year in the U.S. who otherwise would have been citizens, including an estimated 24,500 children born in California annually, and the disruption of vitally important public health and other federal benefit programs.

Bonta is joined by the attorneys general of New Jersey, Massachusetts, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin, along with the City of San Francisco.

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