Birthright Citizenship In The United States: US Birthright citizenship is acquired by virtue of the circumstances of birth. It is pursuant to the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution as well as the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), where U.S. citizenship is automatically given to any person who is born within and subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.
What is Birthright Citizenship in the United States?
The 14th Amendment of the Constitution assurances birthright citizenship and states: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
This means that any child who is born in the United States is automatically a U.S. citizen, no matter if his or her parents are in the country on a temporary basis or are living illegally. Because of this only this long-standing guarantee has given rise to many debates over immigration as well as citizenship concerns that have confounded Congress in the past few years.
Not only this but the Birthright citizenship is also applied to those children who are born elsewhere in the world to U.S. citizens (with certain exceptions), which is also known as jus sanguinis.
Countries having birthright citizenship comprises of the United States, Antigua, and Barbuda, Canada.
Birthright Citizenship Statistics
According to the Pew Hispanic Center report, it estimates that about 7.5% of all births in the U.S. (around 300,000 births per year) are to unauthorized immigrants. They also estimate that there are about 4.5 million children who were born to unauthorized immigrants and have received citizenship by means of birth in the United States, On the other hand, the Migration Policy Institute for the same estimates that there are about 4.1 million children. Both of the estimates exclude anyone who is aged eighteen or else older who might have benefited.
US Birthright citizenship Controversies
Every year, Birthright citizenship comes into the media leading to many controversies. Particularly the term has recently been in the headlines a lot because of the present White House situation. President Donald Trump from the beginning itself proposed in his immigration plan to put a halt in automatically giving citizenship to most people born in the US. Trump had promised to end the birthright citizenship for the duration of his 2016 presidential campaign.
In the year 2018, Trump speaking with Axios said he would end birthright citizenship through an exclusive order, on the other hand, he did not announce a specific timeline for doing so.
He said at that time, “We’re the only country in the world where a person comes in and has a baby, and the baby is essentially a citizen of the United States for 85 years with all of those benefits.”
He further added, “It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous. And it has to end.” In fact, there are more than 30 nations all around the world which have birthright citizenship.
Recently also on Wednesday, Trump said, “We’re looking at that very seriously, birthright citizenship,”
He added, “Birthright citizenship, where you have a baby on our land – walk over the border, have a baby, congratulations, the baby’s now a US citizen,” said the President. “It’s, frankly, ridiculous.”
