President Donald Trump’s latest attempt to limit birthright citizenship has been blocked by a federal judge.
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U.S. District Judge Deborah L. Boardman in Maryland said Wednesday that Trump’s August executive order blocking birthright citizenship in certain cases is “almost certainly unconstitutional,” citing a Supreme Court ruling in June that reinforced the right to birthright citizenship for almost everyone born in the United States.
“This Court must, once again, preliminarily enjoin enforcement of the President’s most recent attempt to strip the right to citizenship,” she wrote in a 35-page opinion accompanying the order.
“The Supreme Court has spoken: Children in the certified class are ‘citizens at birth,’” she wrote.
It follows a legal challenge to an executive order Trump issued last month designed to restrict automatic citizenship to children born to foreign lobbyists, “alien enemies” or other specific exceptions. The case was brought by nonprofit organizations that provide services to immigrants, as well as individuals without permanent immigration status who are new parents to babies born in the U.S.
The ruling marks the latest setback in Trump’s extended efforts to limit birthright citizenship. In August, he issued two executive orders targeting certain cases after the Supreme Court rejected a broader effort to limit birthright citizenship through a January 2025 executive order.
The Supreme Court ruling reaffirmed the long-settled understanding that the 14th Amendment automatically confers citizenship on any child born in the U.S., with limited exceptions for rare cases or the children of diplomats.
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The preliminary injunction applies to a “certified class” of children “identical” to those under the Supreme Court case, Boardman wrote.
She wrote that Trump has attempted to “upend our country’s long-standing tradition of birthright citizenship and eliminate, for large swaths of Americans, the right to citizenship by birth” but that the Supreme Court ruling takes precedence.
“No Presidential Executive Order can undo what the Supreme Court has done,” she wrote.
The White House did not immediately reply to a request for comment early Thursday. But in an interview with Fox News on Wednesday, Attorney General Todd Blanche denied that Trump’s order was in conflict with the Supreme Court’s decision.
“We crafted the E.O. around and in concurrence and understanding with what the Supreme Court said in their decision,” he said. He added, “We’ll continue to fight, as President Trump has talked about for many years, and if we have to go back to the Supreme Court, we will.”
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