High court rejects President Donald Trump’s executive order, leaving intact the longstanding constitutional rule that grants U.S. citizenship to nearly everyone born in the United States.
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected President Donald Trump’s effort to limit birthright citizenship, preserving the longstanding constitutional rule that grants U.S. citizenship to nearly everyone born on American soil — a decision with implications for an estimated 3,400 births in Oklahoma each year.
In a 6-3 decision, the court struck down Trump’s executive order that would have denied automatic citizenship to children born in the United States whose parents were in the country illegally or temporarily. Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, concluded the 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause guarantees citizenship at birth for nearly everyone born in the United States, with only narrow exceptions such as children of foreign diplomats.
The ruling preserves a constitutional interpretation that has stood for more than a century and rejects one of the Trump administration’s most significant efforts to narrow birthright citizenship through executive action.
What it means in Oklahoma
Oklahoma recorded 47,962 live births in 2024.
The state does not collect information about parents’ citizenship or immigration status on birth certificates, so no official count exists of how many Oklahoma births would have been affected by Trump’s order.
However, the Migration Policy Institute and researchers at Pennsylvania State University’s Population Research Institute estimated nationally that approximately 255,000 babies born in the United States each year would have fallen under the executive order’s restrictions. Applying that national proportion to Oklahoma’s annual births suggests about 3,400 Oklahoma babies each year would likely have been born to parents covered by the order.
Because the estimate is based on national demographic modeling rather than Oklahoma-specific data, it should be viewed as an approximation rather than an official state figure.
Constitutional question
Trump signed the executive order on his first day back in office, arguing that children born to parents who are in the country illegally or temporarily are not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States and therefore are not entitled to citizenship under the 14th Amendment.
The Supreme Court rejected that argument.
Roberts wrote that the Citizenship Clause, adopted after the Civil War, guarantees citizenship to nearly every person born in the United States and fulfills the promise that citizenship is “the right to have rights.”
Justice Brett Kavanaugh agreed the executive order could not take effect because federal law confers birthright citizenship, although he disagreed that the Constitution itself required that result. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch dissented, arguing the Constitution does not guarantee citizenship for children born to parents who are in the country unlawfully or temporarily.
Longstanding precedent remains
The ruling leaves intact more than a century of legal precedent interpreting the 14th Amendment, including the Supreme Court’s landmark 1898 decision in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, which recognized birthright citizenship for children born in the United States to noncitizen parents.
The decision means Trump’s executive order will not take effect and that children born in the United States will continue to receive citizenship at birth under the longstanding constitutional interpretation.
