President Donald Trump signed two executive orders Thursday seeking to restrict birthright citizenship, despite a recent Supreme Court ruling that blocked his earlier attempt.
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller said one order declares certain individuals ineligible for automatic citizenship, including “alien enemies of the United States, members of foreign terrorist organizations and large categories of people who lobby an act on behalf of foreign governments.”
The second order aims to deny visas to those engaged in “birth tourism” and take further steps to curb the practice, Miller told reporters in the Oval Office.
The full text of the orders had not been released at the time of the announcement.
The Supreme Court in June overturned Trump’s previous executive order on the issue, ruling that the government could not deny citizenship to children born in the United States who lacked at least one parent with legal status.
“Citizenship, then and now, was the right to have rights − to freely participate in our political community,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the majority. “The Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment extended that promise to ‘every free-born person in this land.’ We keep that promise today.”
Trump, who has made curbing birthright citizenship a central part of his immigration agenda, said the administration was adjusting its approach after the court’s decision.
“We had a very unfortunate decision in the Supreme Court… so we’re making adjustments,” he said.
Legal experts expect the new orders to face immediate court challenges.
