Supreme Court nixes Trump's birthright citizenship order. What to know

The Supreme Court delivered a defeat to President Donald Trump, denying his executive order to restrict birthright citizenship in the United States.

On his first day of his second term, Jan. 20, 2025, Trump issued the order to end automatic citizenship for children whose parents were foreign nationals, whether in the U.S. legally or not. Due to legal challenges, the order did not go into effect.

Trump had campaigned on restricting birthright citizenship, arguing that the citizenship clause had been misinterpreted, and attended the April 2026 oral arguments in a first for a sitting president.

The court's 6-3 ruling, issued Tuesday, June 30, ensures that children born in the country are considered Americans.

"This decision is a powerful affirmation of the Constitution and the enduring promise of equality it represents," said Derrick Johnson, president and CEO of the NAACP, in a statement. "For over 150 years, the Fourteenth Amendment has guaranteed citizenship to everyone born in this country. Today, the Court rightly rejected efforts to undermine that core protection and instead upheld a principle that is essential to our democracy."

What does the Supreme Court ruling mean for families?

The court's decision means that babies of immigrants who are in the country legally and temporarily, perhaps on a work visa or attending a U.S. university – or may be in the country illegally and without permission – are automatically U.S. citizens.

Birthright citizenship protects about 255,000 children born annually in the U.S. to immigrant parents and, had Trump's order stood, would strip an estimated 4.8 million future U.S.-born children of citizenship by 2045 and 12.8 million by 2075, opponents of the order argued in a filing with the Supreme Court, citing data from the Migration Policy Institute.

"The Trump administration tried to narrow the definition of citizenship and the access to the rights that come with it and even this Supreme Court disagreed. This is a real relief, and it is welcome. It is also the bare minimum," said Neidi Dominguez, executive director of workers' group Organized Power In Numbers, in a statement.

Immigrants still face pressures, including last week's Supreme Court ruling that could end Temporary Protective Status for about 1 million people from other countries living in the U.S., including Haitians, Syrians and Venezuelans, she noted.

"Birthright citizenship is protected today," Dominguez said. "But the workers whose children depend on it still face deportation, worksite raids and an administration that has made clear it will use every tool available to make immigrant workers afraid, isolated, and stripped of their rights."

Public support for birthright citizenship

Tuesday's ruling is in line with the views of a majority of Americans, with 55% saying they oppose ending birthright citizenship, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll taken between June 18 and June 26.

Among Democrats, 72% said they oppose ending birthright citizenship, while only 38% of Republicans and 54% of political independents share the same position.

A Quinnipiac University poll conducted between June 18 and June 26 showed the same thing, with 69% saying the Supreme Court should keep birthright citizenship in place.

What is the 14th Amendment?

Ratified in 1868 – and upheld in a ruling in 1898 – the 14th Amendment overturned a 1857 Supreme Court decision that had declared that people of African descent could never be U.S. citizens. It has long been interpreted as guaranteeing citizenship for babies born in the U.S., with only narrow exceptions such as the children of foreign diplomats or members of an enemy occupying force.

"Birthright citizenship was guaranteed through the passage of the 14th Amendment after the Civil War, when formerly enslaved Africans and their allies fought to access equal rights and affirm that children born in the United States have citizenship regardless of where their parents come from," Dominguez said.

Trump's executive order violated the 14th Amendment, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the 6-3 ruling. "Citizenship, then and now, was the right to have rights – to freely participate in our political community," Roberts wrote, adding that the authors ​of the 14th Amendment extended that promise to every free-born person in the land.

"We keep that promise today," Roberts wrote.

Contributing: Maureen Groppe, Fernando Cervantes Jr. and Trevor Hughes, USA TODAY; Reuters

Mike Snider is a national trending news reporter for USA TODAY. You can follow him on Threads, Bluesky, X and email him at  mikegsnider  &  @mikegsnider.bsky.social  &  @mikesnider & [email protected].