His previous attempt to limit birthright citizenship failed.
Donald Trump has launched a second attempt to limit the right to US citizenship by birth (the so-called "right of soil"), signing two special executive orders on Thursday — just over a month after the Supreme Court declared his first attempt to revoke this right unconstitutional, writes the BBC.
One of the orders expands the list of exceptions to the "right of soil," adding new categories of foreigners whose children will not be able to obtain US citizenship, even if born on US territory.
The second order prohibits so-called "birth tourism" — the practice where pregnant foreign women specifically travel to the United States to give birth there and obtain US citizenship for their child based on their place of birth. The USA is one of the few countries where citizenship is acquired by birth on the state's territory.
"This should have happened many years ago, but we are addressing this issue now," Trump stated while signing the orders, which continue his campaign promises to limit migration to the US.
What is the essence of the bans
"My administration has taken action against threats posed by malicious foreign actors attempting to defraud American citizens by taking advantage of our nation's generosity," the first order states.
It prohibits automatic citizenship for children born in the US if their parents are not citizens of the country and at least one of them:
- is a member of a terrorist organization;
- attempted to obtain US citizenship fraudulently;
- works in the US as a representative of another state (this includes diplomats).
The ban on "birth tourism" in the second order means that "no one in the world will ever again be allowed to get a visa for this fraudulent purpose," explained Trump's national security advisor Stephen Miller.
"Such people come here posing as tourists, but their real goal is to give birth to a child, automatically get citizenship for it, and leave our country," he said.
According to Miller, such children then gain access to social benefits, voting rights, and "all other rights and privileges belonging exclusively to Americans." He also stated that the president has the right to ban "birth tourism" based on the relevant section of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which allows for exceptions and restrictions on entry into the country.
Scale of the problem
Announcing the signing of the orders, Trump stated that hundreds of thousands of children were born in the US due to "birth tourism."
"Now people are building businesses around this. Rich people are doing business on birthright citizenship. This should not be," he said.
However, these words contradict estimates from the Migration Policy Institute, based on US census data. According to them, between 22,000 and 26,000 children are born in the US each year as a result of "birth tourism."
In 2024, according to government statistics, 9,600 children were born to mothers with foreign addresses. In total, approximately 3.6 million children were born in the US that year.
As Reuters notes, there is no official data on the number of foreigners who come to the US specifically for the purpose of giving birth to children and obtaining citizenship for them, nor on how much this costs American taxpayers.
The right to birthright citizenship is guaranteed by the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution, which 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."
The amendment was ratified in 1868, shortly after the end of the US Civil War, to secure the rights of former slaves and prevent their restriction by individual states.
Trump made his first attempt to limit the application of this amendment on his first day in the White House in January 2025.
The executive order at that time was stricter: it instructed American agencies not to recognize the citizenship of children born in the US if neither parent was a US citizen or a green card holder.
The litigation reached the Supreme Court, which in June 2026 ruled that Trump's 2025 order violated the 14th Amendment, affirming the right to birthright citizenship.
This was a serious blow to Trump's attempts to limit the circle of individuals eligible to live, work, and obtain citizenship in the US.
Signing the new orders, Trump called the Supreme Court's decision "bad and very unfair," adding that "our country is suffering because of it."
The new orders are also likely to be challenged in court and reviewed for compliance with the 14th Amendment.
According to Gabriel Chin, a professor at the University of California, Davis School of Law, some of their provisions may remain in force, but others "raise serious constitutional questions."
Chin notes that the president does indeed possess certain powers to restrict entry into the US, including for the purpose of giving birth to a child.
"But once it happens, once a child is born in the United States, I don't think the president has the authority to decide that child is not a citizen," he said.
According to Chin, "birth tourism" is a "drop in the bucket" compared to the millions of births that occur annually in the US.
"It's a very rare phenomenon," the professor believes.
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