Oregon joined Washington, Arizona and Illinois on Tuesday in suing President Donald Trump and several cabinet officials over his attempt to withhold citizenship from babies born in the United States to immigrants.
For more than 150 years, the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution has guaranteed that all people born in the country are citizens. Hours after he took office on Monday, Trump signed an executive order to reinterpret that amendment to exclude from citizenship any children born to undocumented immigrants or to people who are legally in the country on a temporary basis, such as with a student, work or tourist visa.
Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield Trump鈥檚 attempt to 鈥渟idestep鈥� the Fourteenth Amendment a 鈥渃lear violation of the United States Constitution.鈥�
鈥淚f allowed to stand, this order would break decades of established law that has helped keep kids healthy and safe,鈥� said Rayfield. 鈥淲hile the President has every right to issue executive orders during his time in office, that power does not extend to instituting policies that infringe on our constitutional rights.鈥�
Rayfield, a Democrat elected in November, signed onto a led by newly elected Washington Attorney General Nick Brown and filed in the U.S. District Court in Western Washington. The Democratic attorneys general of Arizona and Illinois joined the suit, which requests a temporary restraining order blocking Trump鈥檚 executive order from taking effect.
The suit follows a separate, similar filed earlier Tuesday by California and 17 other Democratic states, the District of Columbia and the city and county of San Francisco in federal district court in Massachusetts. California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin were part of that lawsuit.
Both lawsuits argue that Trump鈥檚 order will result in tens of thousands of children losing rights and the ability to access services, and that states would lose federal funding they now rely on to provide essential services including foster care and basic health care for low-income children.
Fourteenth Amendment
In Oregon, for instance, about 2,500 children were born in 2022 to mothers who lacked legal status, and about 1,500 of those children were born to parents who both lacked legal status, the lawsuit said. Those children would remain citizens under Trump鈥檚 order, which isn鈥檛 retroactive, but babies born after Feb. 19 would not.
鈥淭he individuals who are stripped of their United States citizenship will be rendered undocumented, subject to removal or detention, and many will be stateless 鈥� that is, citizens of no country at all,鈥� the Western states鈥� lawsuit said. 鈥淭hey will lose eligibility for myriad federal benefits programs. They will lose their right to travel freely and re-enter the United States. They will lose their ability to obtain a Social Security number (SSN) and work lawfully. They will lose their right to vote, serve on juries, and run for certain offices. And they will be placed into lifelong positions of instability and insecurity as part of a new underclass in the United States.鈥�
Much of the 85-page court filing describes the history and precedent of the Fourteenth Amendment, one of the three Reconstruction amendments passed in the wake of the Civil War to expand voting rights and citizenship to formerly enslaved people. The Fourteenth Amendment spells out that anyone born or naturalized and subject to its jurisdiction 鈥� i.e. not the child of a foreign diplomat or an enemy combatant 鈥� in the U.S. is a citizen, with no further action required.
The U.S. Supreme Court upheld that interpretation in an 1898 case, United States v. Wong Kim Ark, cited in the lawsuit. It held that Wong, born in San Francisco to Chinese immigrants, was a citizen because he was born in the U.S. and thus could not be barred from returning to the U.S. because the Chinese Exclusion Acts passed by Congress to prevent Chinese laborers from coming to the country could not apply to citizens.
Registering to vote
The suit also notes that a U.S. birth certificate has long been considered adequate proof of citizenship for the Social Security Administration and for state-run voter registration.
Arizona, one of the plaintiffs, is the only state in the country that requires proof of citizenship to register to vote in state elections 鈥� all others follow the federal requirement that potential voters swear under penalty of perjury that they鈥檙e citizens. If being born in the U.S. is no longer a guarantee of citizenship, the state would need to develop a new and more complex set of procedures to determine which voters are eligible, the lawsuit said.
Oregon鈥檚 automatic voter registration system, likewise, uses birth certificates as proof of citizenship. If someone brings a U.S. birth certificate to Driver and Motor Vehicle Services to apply for a driver鈥檚 license or state-issued ID, state workers send their information to the Secretary of State鈥檚 Office to register that person to vote.
The states also argued that stripping citizenship from newborn babies would place a financial burden on states. The federal government covers much of the cost of health care for low-income children who are citizens through Medicaid and the Children鈥檚 Health Insurance Program. But the states that sued pick up costs for all or some health care for undocumented children who would be eligible for Medicaid if they were citizens.
In Oregon, for instance, the Oregon Health Plan covers all children and teens younger than 19 and whose families earn up to about three times the federal poverty level, regardless of immigration status. If thousands of children are blocked from citizenship, the state鈥檚 costs would increase.
The states also anticipate losing federal funding for foster care and spending more to train health care workers to collect citizenship information from parents at a child鈥檚 birth, the lawsuit says.
Rayfield has joined other lawsuits, including intervening last week in suits seeking to preserve federal gun regulations and health insurance for children of undocumented immigrants. Gov. Tina Kotek has requested that the Oregon Legislature increase his office鈥檚 budget by $2 million in anticipation of more federal litigation against Trump policies.