Donald Trump put pen to paper on Thursday, signing a pair of executive orders that go after birthright citizenship categories and the booming business of so called birth tourism. If at first you don't succeed with the Supreme Court, try, try again with slightly different paperwork, apparently.
As Trending Politics reported, these new orders come on the heels of the Supreme Court's June 30, 2026, ruling in Trump v. Barbara. That case dealt with Trump's original January 20, 2025, executive order that told federal agencies to stop recognizing citizenship for kids born on U.S. soil to parents who were either here illegally or temporarily, when the other parent wasn't a citizen or permanent resident. The Court basically said the Fourteenth Amendment covers children born to parents in America "for whom no extraterritorial fiction applies." So Trump got a partial setback and immediately promised to come back swinging.
And swing he did. The first order identifies groups of children who the administration says fall outside birthright citizenship based on historical exceptions the Court recognized. Under this policy, no federal agency will issue or accept citizenship documents for a person when neither parent is American and one of these situations applies: a parent belongs to a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization or is a Specially Designated Global Terrorist, or a parent works for a foreign government. That includes ambassadors, embassy and consulate employees who are nationals of that country, anyone working for a foreign government in an official capacity, and international organization employees who enjoy immunity.
The second order takes aim at birth tourism, which the White House defines as foreign nationals hopping on temporary visas specifically to deliver a baby on American soil so the kid gets a U.S. passport. Apparently there are entire operations advertising accommodations and services to make this happen, which sounds like the world's most bureaucratic vacation package.
The order's purpose section waxes poetic about citizenship being a "sacred bond" and definitely "not a commodity to be acquired through calculated exploitation." The Secretaries of State and Homeland Security now have authority to block visas, deny entry, revoke visas, remove people engaging in birth tourism, and go after the operators facilitating the whole thing. Humanitarian exemptions and national interest exceptions are still on the table.
During the Oval Office signing ceremony, Trump called the Supreme Court ruling "very unfortunate" and said he was "making adjustments because it's very unfair." He then added that people are "building businesses around birthright citizenship" and "buying their way in," declaring that his administration won't let it continue.
So basically, the Supreme Court told Trump he couldn't go as far as he wanted, and Trump responded by going exactly as far as the Court said he could, while setting up a whole new framework to combat maternity ward tourism. Whether these orders survive the inevitable legal challenges is anyone's guess, but one thing's for sure: the lawyers are eating well tonight.
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