The Question the Trump Administration Couldn’t Answer About Birthright Citizenship
Forty-six minutes into the Supreme Court’s oral argument in the birthright-citizenship litigation, Solicitor General D. John Sauer got a question he couldn’t answer. Arguing on behalf of the government, Sauer wants the Court to prohibit nationwide injunctions, allowing President Donald Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship—along with many of his other policies—to go into effect. Justice Brett Kavanaugh, a Trump appointee, wanted to know how, exactly, the government would administer a rule denying citizenship to potentially hundreds of thousands of babies every year.
“On the day after it goes into effect,” Kavanaugh asked, “how’s it going to work—what do hospitals do with a newborn? What do states do with a newborn?”
“We don’t know,” Sauer candidly told the Court, saying that “federal officials will have to figure that out.” Later, he added, “Hopefully, they will do so.”
Really? With this one exchange, Sauer inadvertently revealed why nationwide injunctions are at times the only way to protect the public. The administration has no workable plan for its unconstitutional order, yet it wants to take away the best legal pathway for those affected to challenge the government’s action.