The U.S. Supreme Court is set to hear oral arguments next month on President Trump’s plan to end birthright citizenship, a right enshrined in the 14th Amendment that guarantees anyone born in the U.S. automatic citizenship. That includes children born to mothers in the country illegally.
Trump’s broad executive order, which would terminate that automatic right, is seen by many as a key part of the administration’s hardline approach to immigration. New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin is co-leading a multistate lawsuit challenging the order.
“Every court that has looked at this issue since January 20th has sided with us,” said Platkin in an interview with NJ Spotlight News. Arguments on May 15 will center around whether the issue should be decided based on the state in which a person lives.
“It can’t be the case that if a parent takes their child to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, but they live in South Jersey, that the citizenship of that child should be determined based on the hospital that they go to. No one thinks the Constitution works that way, and that’s why I’m confident we will prevail,” Platkin said.
“In New Jersey you’d have thousands of children born every year who have some status that this administration hasn’t even tried to articulate,” said Platkin. “For the first time ever, we’d have a second-class status of residents here. It just says that they’re not citizens. It doesn’t say what they are.”
The Supreme Court has a 6-3 conservative majority.
“If this administration continues to flout the rule of law, if they continue to do things that hurt residents including in our state, cutting critical programs, violating their rights in ways that hurt them unlawfully, then there are real problems that this country is going to face as a result,” said Platkin.
Platkin has joined or is leading more than a dozen lawsuits and amicus briefs against the Trump administration’s executive orders and actions. Gov. Phil Murphy noted in his annual budget address this year he was setting aside $1 million to help the attorney general’s office complete that work.
Platkin pushed back when asked if the office can keep up with the demand while also enforcing state laws.
“By working literally around the clock, we’ve had people sleeping in their offices, we’ve had people work themselves sick because they care so deeply about the impact that is being had on our residents,” said Platkin.
“We’re not filing cases simply because we disagree or because there’s some fringe issue. We’re bringing lawsuits all in-house because the president has violated the law and hurt residents of New Jersey. By my count, we have saved the state just in the first 2.5 months of the administration, over $22 billion. That’s $22 billion with a B.”
