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President Trump’s Justice Department has taken the fight over birthright citizenship all the way to the Supreme Court, asking justices to allow enforcement of his January executive order that denies automatic citizenship to children born here to parents who are in the country illegally or merely temporarily. This is precisely the kind of common-sense, patriotic policy Americans sent him back to Washington to enact — to restore meaning to citizenship and stop the exploitative practice of birth tourism. The administration’s filing seeks to roll back decades of judicial expansion and put the question where it belongs: before the Constitution and the people.
Veteran jurist Andrew Napolitano — a conservative voice who still calls them as he sees them — warned viewers that the legal road is complicated and that presidents cannot simply rewrite constitutional text with the stroke of a pen. Napolitano’s sober judicial perspective should temper the fevered rhetoric on both sides: yes, the 14th Amendment must be respected, but the debate over what its language actually meant in 1868 is not merely academic. Voters should listen to people like Napolitano who stress that courts, the legislature, and the people all have roles in righting this wrong.
Lower federal judges in multiple districts moved quickly to block the order, issuing injunctions that have, until recently, prevented federal agencies from implementing the policy nationwide. Civil-rights groups and several states rushed to court because this is a profound constitutional and moral question with real children and families caught in the middle of a legal tug-of-war. Those injunctions have been controversial precisely because they turned single-district rulings into de facto national policy — a judicial overreach that ordinary Americans rightly resent.
Recognizing the chokehold that nationwide injunctions can impose on executive action, the Justice Department hit the high court with a narrower tactical request: limit the scope of those injunctions so the administration can begin to enforce its order against parties not involved in the original suits. This pragmatic move doesn’t demand an immediate ruling on the full constitutional question; it asks the Court to rein in an unelected judiciary that has been weaponizing preliminary orders to freeze administration policies across the country. It’s a clever, lawful way to get the policy debated on its merits.
Conservatives should take heart that the Supreme Court has already signaled discomfort with universal injunctions, a development that opens a path for the administration’s agenda without the Court having to rewrite the 14th Amendment on day one. That June ruling limiting nationwide injunctions was a welcome corrective to judicial overreach and vindicated principled concerns about separation of powers and federalism. If the Court will only constrain rogue district judges from dictating national policy, then elected leaders can do their jobs restoring sane immigration rules that put Americans first.
This fight is bigger than pure legal hair-splitting; it’s about fairness, sovereignty, and common sense. For years the judicial and bureaucratic establishment has allowed loopholes that reward people who break our laws and saddle hardworking taxpayers with the costs. Republicans and conservatives must marshal coherent legal theory, strong public messaging, and political courage to press this issue until the American people see that citizenship must be earned or properly legislated, not handed out by accident of birthplace alone.
Judge Napolitano’s warning about constitutional limits is useful — it reminds conservatives that winning on policy requires more than forceful rhetoric; it requires sound law and disciplined advocacy. But that legal prudence should not be an excuse for timidity: fight the good fight in court, demand Congress fix the statute if necessary, and elect judges who respect original meaning. The American people deserve a citizenship policy that defends our borders, honors our Constitution, and puts patriotic citizens first.
