By T N Ashok
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump first wanted to end birthright citizenship with an executive order issued on January 20, 2025, the day he assumed office for his 2nd nonconsecutive term as president. Again on June 20, 2025, he issued an EO for the Department of Justice (DOJ) to issue an edict for denaturalization of citizens in certain categories such as crime and illegal means of obtaining nationality.
While birthright citizenship issue is not yet settled in courts, the Supreme Court has only blocked injunctions from lesser courts against a president’s Executive Order , but not yet decided the constitutionality of such a matter, which is sought to be questioned under various articles of the 14th amendment, which grants citizenship to anyone born in the USA irrespective of the status of the parents.
Both the writer of the judgement Associate Justice Amy Cony Barrett, a Trump appointee, and Bret Kavanaugh, another appointee of Trump, had clearly stated that their order is limited in scope to the injunctions being issued by lower courts on the president’s EO on the matter – that is leaving the main subject matter of ending birthright citizenship open or further litigation through class action lawsuits for those who moved the petitions to seek relief.
There are some 28 states which have seen courts flooded with petitions questioning the president’s EO on ending birthright citizenship as being violative of the four articles enunciated in the 14th amendment which was brought by the congress to grant citizenship to freed American slaves from Africa. Soon after the Supreme Court order, groups such as ACLU moved in New Hampshire and Maryland for relief.
The clauses in question are Citizenship clause, Immunities and Privileges, Due Process and Equal protection. All these provisions make it amply clear that citizenship ensures civic rights, the explanation of the privileges of citizenship and immunities that goes along with it and the due process of law to enforce it against challenges and equal protection to the new class of citizens sought to be naturalized along with the same protection already accorded to already naturalized citizens.
Trump’s EO goes into effect in some 28 states immediately where the injunctions have been removed and also to various other EOs of the president which have been blocked in courts for him to have a free ride with his legislation.
Associated with the EO on ending birthright citizenship is the question of the constitutional validity of the 14th amendment along with its four clauses , mentioned before, that are being sought to be questioned some 240 years later in a divided America along strictly ethnic lines – an extension of the Make America Great Again –MAGA – into a MAKE AMERICA WHITE AGAIN, because the 14th amendment was virtually enacted after the then Republican president Abraham Lincoln fought a civil war and freed the African slaves and gave them liberty and the right to vote.
Trump, according to his critics, is seeking to subvert the constitution by creating a class of two categories of citizens – those born in the USA and those who came in as immigrants , there was a first wave, a second wave , a third wave, a fourth wave and so on since the 16th century, when America was first discovered by Columbus.
As Barack Obama, the 1st black African American president, said what is this immigration issue (that’s bothering the nation) it seems to be a question of who came first. The immigration issue seems to be a remnant of the issues that bothered the confederation of states that fought a civil war against the abolition of slavery and lost it. It is resurfacing again in the confederate states more than in the union of states.
The first batch of immigrants want to end the citizenship rights of the subsequent batches of immigrants – so in law that would be very much questionable as the founding fathers of American constitution sought to give equal rights to all naturalized citizens , those born in the USA and those born to immigrant populations irrespective of their status.
In the 1st wave came the Irish, British, Scot, Welsh,polish , Italians, and in the subsequent waves came the black africans, asians, south asians, latinos , and others.
The question here is irrespective of the status of the newborn children’s parents of a non-naturalized citizen. Trump’s EO says end birthright citizenship of children born to immigrant who have no legal status to stay in the country, or have committed crimes, or been member part of gangs that commit crimes or is involved in smuggling narcotics into the country ( such as opioids like Heroin or Fentanyl that causes the death of some 100,000 American youths either due to drug abuse or over dose following addiction).
Ending of birthright citizenship is therefore an issue of contention between the executive (government) and the citizens that should drag on in law courts for a long time as it also involves the constitutional validity of the 14th amendment – and any attempt to end it would create millions of stateless citizens that could create major civil unrest, disobedience, riots and chaos and confusion leading perhaps to a state of anarchy.
Both the liberals in the GOP and the liberals (Democrats) want to avoid any ugly situation that could put some states against the other as in the 18th century when America went for a civil war against the abolition and protection of civil rights of the freed American slaves and their right to liberty and freedom. Now the de-naturalisation of a certain class of citizens follows a corollary in the above mentioned scenario
So, what has the DOJ done? The Department of Justice has initiated a denaturalization process aimed at revoking the citizenship of individuals who obtained it through fraud or who have committed serious crimes, such as terrorism or sexual offenses. This effort reflects a broader commitment to ensure that citizenship is not granted to those who pose a threat to society or who have misrepresented their eligibility.
The Justice Department is aggressively prioritizing efforts to strip some Americans of their U.S. citizenship. Department leadership is directing its attorneys to prioritize denaturalization in cases involving naturalized citizens who commit certain crimes — and giving district attorneys wider discretion on when to pursue this tactic, according to a June 11 memo published online.
The move is aimed at U.S. citizens who were not born in the country; according to data from 2023, close to 25 million immigrants were naturalized citizens.
At least one person has already been denaturalized in recent weeks. On June 13, a judge ordered the revocation of the citizenship of Elliott Duke, who uses they/them pronouns. Duke is an American military veteran originally from the U.K. who was convicted for distributing child sexual abuse material — something they later admitted they were doing prior to becoming a U.S. citizen.
Denaturalization is a tactic that was heavily used during the McCarthy era of the late 1940’s and the early 1950’s and one that was expanded during the Obama administration and grew further during President Trump’s first term. It’s meant to strip citizenship from those who may have lied about their criminal convictions or membership in illegal groups like the Nazi party, or communists during McCarthyism, on their citizenship applications.
The denaturalization has exponentially grown from 14% in Obama’s regime to over 30% in Trump’s presidency in the second term. And that worries critics on the basis of fears that it could be misused against political opponents or to break voting blocks of certain political parties that derive their strength from ethnic populations.
Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate wrote in the memo that pursuing denaturalization will be among the agency’s top five enforcement priorities for the civil rights division.
“The Civil Division shall prioritize and maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings in all cases permitted by law and supported by the evidence,” he said.
The focus on denaturalization is just the latest step by the Trump administration to reshape the nation’s immigration system across all levels of government, turning it into a major focus across multiple federal agencies.
That has come with redefining who is let into the United States or has the right to be an American. Since his return to office, the president has sought to end birthright citizenship and scale back refugee programs. But immigration law experts expressed serious concerns about the effort’s constitutionality, and how this could impact families of naturalized citizens.
The DOJ memo says that the federal government will pursue denaturalization cases via civil litigation — an especially concerning move, said Cassandra Robertson, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University.
In civil proceedings, any individual subject to denaturalization is not entitled to an attorney, Robertson said; there is also a lower burden of proof for the government to reach, and it is far easier and faster to reach a conclusion in these cases. Robertson says that stripping Americans of citizenship through civil litigation violates due process and infringes on the rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. (IPA Service)
