I wonder whether Trump has ever read the 14th Amendment?

Amendment XIV
Section 1.

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. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxiv

That's the relevant part.

His opinion on this if accurately stated in the OP probably disqualifies him from running in our country. He can go start his own country if he has enough money to buy some land, but in our country, you are a citizen if you are born or naturalized in the Unites States and subject to the jurisdiction of the US.

Trump is not qualified to talk about the Constitution on TV. He is just a joke. There isn't any argument on this point. Where are the lawyers who support him on this issue? I want their names, and I want to know how in the world they passed a state bar examination in any state in this country.

You stated the 14th Amendment but did not read it.

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. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

"Subject to the jurisdiction thereof" is the qualifier. You are not a citizen simply because you are born here.

Or do you read that to mean that they are required to follow the laws of this country and appear if called into court?

A person can be born in the US, travel overseas and still retain citizenship. There is no requirement that a person's parent be a citizen, just that the person is born in the US.

My children were born overseas and obtained American citizenship because I am a citizen.

As for people having two citizenships, I do not know if it is still true, but years ago, the Greek government did not recognize a renunciation of citizenship. I know another person who was naturalized in our country by virtue of his parents naturalization, returned to the country of his birth and discovered that he was still a citizen of the country of his birth. He had dual citizenship. In fact, today, many people have dual citizenship, and I don't think that American law prohibits it.

We purposely made it easy for people to become citizens at the time the 14th Amendment was written.

Is Ted Cruz an American citizen in your view? What is the story on his citizenship?

because his mother was still an Irish citizen at the time of his birth. Would BOTH parents have to be American citizens at the time of a child's birth? Where did we here this one before?

It can get even trickier than that. I worked with a few children in school whose fathers were migrant workers (illegal?), but their mothers were born in the US and citizens. Not married. Who's your Daddy????? Start doing blood tests and require a family tree on people?

Absurd.

Ted Cruz is a citizen because his mother is a citizen, just like your children are citizens because you are.

The 14th Amendment was adopted to guarantee citizenship to freed slaves and right a wrong Dred Scott decision.

You can have dual citizenship in another country if you apply for it and are granted it based on their laws.

Following the laws of this country if you are a visitor is not the same as "subject to jurisdiction". You must always obey the laws of a country you are visiting but you are still subject to the jurisdiction of the country of your citizenship.

subject to the jurisdiction of the US.

I don't see how you can determine that a baby born here could be a visitor. If a baby is born here, it is a citizen pursuant to the 14th Amendment and hence, it is subject to the jurisdiction of the US.

My grandparents' parents immigrated here. I don't know that they became citizens officially. My great-grandfather on my father's side was born in Germany and came here before he was a year old. His father volunteered to fight for the Union in the Civil War although I doubt that he was naturalized. I don't know, but I doubt it. My great-grandfather, aged 12, went with his father to the Civil War and ran reconnaissance for the Union Army. I don't think he ever became a citizen. But certainly they were both subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.

Trump's problem with the 14th Amendment is absolutely strange. He does not understand it. The interpretation of the 14th Amendment is pretty set in stone. There really isn't any quesiton that if you are born in the US, you are a citizen of the US.

If you are within our borders, you are subject to the laws and enforcement thereof. You are under the jurisdiction of US law. You may indeed commit a crime, but you are then subject to the legal consequences of that crime under US jurisdiction. Whether or not you get away with a violation of our laws is a different matter, as of course many of our citizens do.

There is also the matter of judicial interpretation and implementation, which has held and practiced birthright citizenship for nearly 150 years under the 14th Amendment (and for the entire history of our country before that, with the exception of those subject to slavery).

Just as the phrase "as part of a well-regulated militia" in our 2nd Amendment has ceased to have meaning because of judicial precedent and interpretation, our record of past implementation of the 14th Amendment is recognized law.

And if you throw out birthright citizenship, how retroactive are you willing to make it. If you are the descendant of, say, an Irish immigrant from 1870 that was not a citizen, does that mean that all the descendants of that ancestor are no longer lawful citizens?

though he lived here for 66 years. His wife was an American Citizen, she was born to Polish Immigrants, who to all we know, never became citizens. Does this make my grandmother an anchor baby, does it make my mom an anchor baby. I hate that term "anchor baby."

The Supreme Court settled this issue in 1898 with the Wong Kim Ark case in which they stated unequivocally that the jurisdiction clause pertains ONLY to diplomats, it in no way was ever intended to pertain to persons who are not on diplomatic mission from a foreign country.

If any part of your claim were even remotely true that would imply that ALL foreigners were not under US jurisdiction which means they would not be subject to US law and could not be arrested or charged under us law. All foreigners woudl have diplomatic immunity, that's simply not true and the idea is complete rubbish.

"You are not a citizen simply because you are born here."

The Supreme Court begs to differ.

Wong Kim Ark's parents were here legally. They were not foreigners passing through but here for extended term conducting business.

at the time born and thereafter.

If Trump wants to change the law on our citizenship, he has to change our Constitution.

If you are born within the United States, you are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.

And if your parents obtain a certificate of birth abroad, they are placing you under the jurisdiction of the US government. The 14th Amendment does not define who is NOT a citizen of the US. It merely states that if you are born or naturalized in the US (and therefore subject to the jurisdiction of the US -- which is understood if at the time of your birth you are within the US -- then you are a citizen. It does not even state that you have to be born within the US to be a citizen.

If you do not have US citizenship, but you drive over the speed limit while in the US, you soon learn that you are under the jurisdiction of US law enforcement and the jurisdiction of the state in which you have exceeded the speed limit.

It's really very clear. You cannot be born within the US and not be subject to the jurisdiction of the US unless your parents are in the diplomatic corps, I suppose, and you have some kind of diplomatic immunity. Even then???

The Constitution does not need to be changed. Congress has the power to write laws granting citizenship.

Obeying the law as a visitor to a foreign country is not the same as being subject to the jurisdiction of your country. Yes, you can break a law and be prosecuted but you are still a citizen of the country from which you came.

Congress might try to redefine what the 14th Amendment means, but the issue would go to the Supreme Court.

How would you define American citizenship if you could define it?

Reading comprehension. It's FUNdamental.

Subject to the jurisdiction can be as little as physical location. For instance. The government cannot summarily execute an 'illegal' immigrant for jaywalking in U.S. Territory. Cruel and unusual, Etc.

Yes. Trump is a joke. A very bad joke in very poor taste. Enough is enough of him.

when O'Reilly comes across as the moderate...

This beastie they built (the teaparty) has a life of its own now, and it's hungry and needs to be fed.
Oh well, not really a 'democrat' problem, is it?

These people are nuts. I can't believe our political discourse has degenerated to this level. God help us! But she won't.

before they could seek permanent residence through that child. U.S. immigration laws could be changed to perpetually prevent family members from petitioning for permanent residence through that child. Maybe the idea that parents and family members could never file for residency in the U.S. to legally be with that child might render unnecessary a constitutional convention. The parents might never come up here knowing they will be permanently barred from immigration. But since they already have to wait until that child is 21, I don't think these so-called "anchor babies" are really anchors. i think this is a fiction and that these children don't make up any significant part of the current immigration problem. I would like to see the statistics.

Tell us again how Obama is ripping up the constitution, Fuckin ass idiots.

Last edited Wed Aug 19, 2015, 11:29 AM - Edit history (1)

They leave out the 'well organized militia' part .

They think it means private militias.

Yesterday I heard a clip of a Fox News reporter backing up Trump, and they made the false statement that the 14th has never been been challenged by the U.S. Supreme Court. This occurred not an hour after I read an article on CNN about Wong.

BUYING citizenship?

I don't think he's going to like a bunch of Arabs coming in, buying citizenship, and voting him the hell out of office.

He's just proving he is not a smart man.

Yes, I have a genius for understatement.

Let's see first one would have to create a trodden down servant class that's willing to work for little money -- CHECK

Then one would have to start trying to move nature reservations into country clubs and golf clubs --check (starting in some places)

Then one would have to work in it becoming a tax paradise for rich and companies but not middle class and working class -- check

Then cause some form of housing revolution moving cheap and middle income housing to hands of investors so we can 'company store' the rent and move them from areas where we don't want them.......... ...... ...

it would be beneficial to start an anti immigrant (poor immigrants) feeling to keep the working classes fighting each other -- work in progress (at least visibly...behind the scenes...it's a 'check')

on a side note
Why would Saudis want to buy citizenship in America? they are treated as royalty where they are?

unless they want a Florida Mansion with Intercoastal access to a 2 helipad yacht and 5 blonde (sorta) virgins a week


any semblance to sarcasm and irony is purely in the mind of the writer

"immigration has always been easier for rich than poor"

Does the immigrant's child weigh more than a duck?

how can the 14th Amendment be "unconstitutional?" It is the Constitution. Trump is an idiot.

The stupidity burns

won't accomplish a thing. They live in a fact-free world where only belief counts. Facts must cede to belief 100 times out of 100 because there ARE no facts in their world.

Trying to get actual, extrinsic, verifiable facts into their heads is like trying to pound a piece of cooked spaghetti into a block of metallized hydrogen.

Very well stated

Will try again, uncooked.

<lumps back off to basement lab>

I suppose if a new one conflicted with one of the bill or rights...too much for my puny brain. I guess I need to go spend a night in a Holiday Inn or a Trump Casino.

The Twenty-first Amendment (Amendment XXI) to the United States Constitution repealed the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which had mandated nationwide Prohibition on alcohol on January 17, 1920. The Twenty-first Amendment was ratified on December 5, 1933.

Constitution: 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

Confederate: No! No! This is unconstitutional! I'm going to hold my breath and turn blue! Waaah!

There's a thread with Palin doing some indecipherable rambling (even for her) on Greta VanI'mstillontheair?'s show. Greta mentions that Laura Ingraham had told her the same basic thing that Trump is saying. I am sure that the RW writers are each doing a piece on it to cement it as fake in their bubble.

O'Reilly gets something wrong, though, as well as Bush's legal advisers. The due process part applies not just to citizens, but to "any person."

nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

POWs, enemy combatants, illegal immigrants--doesn't matter. As long as they are people, the constitution says they are entitled to due process.

In his universe, corporations are "Persons", poor humans are not.

Sheesh.

can not be overturned by the Court. It takes another Amendment to repeal it. Trump failed elementary school civics.

What a fool.

and most of them have been.

I don't know how the courts would rule, but I do know the intent of the 14th amendment was to guarentee citizenship to slaves. It was not to confer citizenship to children born of illegal immigrants. Of course, I don't believe there was such a thing back in 1868.

The concept of legal or illegal immigrants is a modern concept, it did not exist at the time of the ratification of the 14th amendment.

"I don't know how the courts would rule"

They ruled 120 years ago in Kim Wong Ark and they ruled that the 14th grants citizenship to all persons born on US soil regardless of the parents citizenship or status.

Yea, right. He can't be this stupid. I still think he's going to drop out after he gets his massive ego fix.

Yeah, he CAN be that stupid.

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jul/08/donald-trump-latino-vote-mexico-immigration

It's obvious that the Fourteenth Amendment presents a huge problem to government administrations that rely on the small government format. They embrace the concept of republican vs democratic principles, which is to say that they recognize that the decision making power is in the hands of representatives. Where they fail the American litmus test is due diligence, due process and Equal protection. That's all in the Fourteenth Amendment. It is for this reason that Republicans, since way back in Newt Gingrich's time, have been trying to get rid of it all together. And I just don't understand why Democrats have been so slow to recognize this.

WE SHOULD BE ASSAULTING THEM IN THE COURTS WITH THIS AMENDMENT. A few wins will change the political winds overnight.

Justin Bieber needs to get the frack out of my country! He isn't an "anchor baby", he's worse! He was born outside of the US, and both his parents are foreigners. They weren't even married when he was born, to boot!

Selena Gomez, born in the USA (Texas) to two married American parents, obviously can stay. After all, her father is Mexican-American who was born in Texas, and her mother is half-Italian, but still born in the USA.


Oh wait, not the "color-correction" that was intended by Trump's diatribe? Too bad.


<---- for those whose Sarcas-O-Meters are broken.


Furthermore, according to Trump's stupid logic, some nobody by the name of Bruce Lee should have never been allowed in the United States.

Bruce Lee was born in San Francisco to two Chinese parents, both not US citizens. Therefore, he was simply an "anchor baby" and should have been deported from the US, if he wasn't already taken back to Hong Kong by his parents because his father was part of a travelling Chinese performing arts group.

Yup, those anchor babies don't amount to anything. After all, Bruce Lee never made anything of himself! Right?

You drop them in the Rio Grande. If they sink = anchor baby, if they float = push them across the river with a stick.

And over 100 years ago the Supreme Court interpreted the "birthright" clause as applying to anyone born in the US. It's settled. Done. Overwith.

And tRump is an ignorant ass.

Goddammit I miss Jon Stewart for lunacies like these.

You never know what the Supreme Shysters will rule is or isn't constitutional nowadays. If they can rule that corporations are people and have human rights, they can rule that Latinos are not people and have no human rights.

closer to mediocre.

Since the more nebulous "person" language in the 14th amendment has been used over the last century to let activist corporate court clerks and justices to use it to give corporations "personhood rights" since the language didn't say "natural" persons the way the authors probably had meant it to have said. Read more here:

http://www.crisismagazine.com/2012/corporate-personhood-and-14th-amendment-rights

If the Supreme Court overturns it, they risk other court challenges to Citizen's United (not having to use a constitutional amendment the way Move to Amend is feeling the need to do now) since the legal "basis" for that decision (the 14th amendment) would no longer exist and therefore invalidate many of the decisions that were based on this corporate personhood interpretation. I think that Roberts, Alito, etc. are smart enough to keep that from happening, and if they hear a challenge by Trump's people, they probably would rule against it for those selfish reasons that their corporate backers would want them to use.

What a sick, fucking joke. WTF is the matter with his "supporters", anyway? Shallow, simplistic thinkers, I suppose. Trump isn't running for POTUS, he's running for President of Straight White Male Fantasy Land.

tell the entire Republican electorate they've been punked.

I would be proud after that to call Trump one of my idols!

His overblown ego is similar to Romney's, so Trump also thinks this country somehow "owes it to him" to elect him president. Just like Romney.

That one has been making its rounds in the right wing for a couple of years now. The 14th Amendment technically doesn't apply birthright citizenship to everyone in America. It applies birthright citizenship to everyone born in America who is also subject to American law. The "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" exception was put in the amendment so that the children of foreign diplomats aren't awarded citizenship.

The right has been making the argument that people who enter the country without permission aren't here legally and therefore aren't subject to American law. Because they aren't subject to the law, their children can't be citizens. The argument is BS, but the right has never been strong on logic.

Remember their outrage when the Clinton Administration did this?

plan to put all the 13 million 'deportees' to work for 20 years as punishment for their crimes? before you deport them.

"Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction."

There is a Supreme Court case, United States vs. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), which says that, with a few specific exceptions, such as the children of diplomats, anyone born in the US is an American citizen. Wong's parents were both Chinese subjects, prevented from becoming citizens by the Chinese Exclusion Acts. Yet Wong, because he was born in San Francisco, was held to be a natural born American citizen. See Justice Gray's opinion at http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0169_0649_ZS.html

If Trump has lawyers who say that Wong Kim Ark is not the law, then I suggest that their grades in Constitutional Law be retroactively changed to F.

Trump is a narcissitic loudmouth, but he's not enough of an idiot to believe this. and there's no way any actual consulting lawyer, let alone one hired by a famous billionaire, would offer this kind of advice.

i think this is more evidence that Trump's playing the GOP for fools, for whatever reason -- maybe he sees the primaries as a natural extension of his reality show career.

Andy Kaufman lives.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9a/Akaufman1.jp

Never mind that birthright citizenship has been settled law for over a century.

Damn the facts. Throw out more red meat for the base.

If your family has been here seven generations you can stay. Your obviously a real American then.

Everyone needs to be shipped to Mexico regardless.

1. Specialty?
2. How many lawyers?
3. They work where?
4. Names would be nice to check for bias?

I think deporting kids that have lived their entire lives as Americans is despicable but this goes beyond that.
What an utter asshole.

That supplied the "investigators" who were going to bring back proof of Obama's non-citizenship from Hawaii.

...he's boasting that it won't cover anchor babies. He thinks that SOMEHOW the Supreme Court would agree that the 14th Amendment doesn't apply to anchor babies. Unfortunately for him, whatever the 14th intent (i.e. to give freed slaves citizenship), the courts have to judge on what the amendment *says* and it says that if one is BORN in the U.S., then one is a U.S. citizen. It doesn't stipulate that one's parents must be citizens legal or otherwise.

However, Trump is nothing if not world class scam artist, and he's doing a very good job of promising the moon to the gullible. "Vote for me," he says, "i know how to get around these pesky laws that are keeping those you hate in your country."

But I'm doubtful that he really wants to be president, especially if it means he might have to put-up or shut-up. I think he just wants to make some really good deals with the Republicans in exchange for urging his supporters to vote for the GOP nominee. After all, given their rich backers and control of congress, the GOP could pay out a lot to him for his supporters.

Till then, he'll do his best to convince right-wingers he can give them everything and anything, so that he ends up with a huge bargaining chip when nomination time rolls around.

He's saying that the precedent set in Wong can be overturned by a new case, which it can.

...language too that gave us "Citizen's United" rather than having to go through a constitutional amendment to get rid of that POS "stare decisis" that gave us the likes of the Citizen's United decision.

If they don't need a constitutional amendment, maybe we don't either to overturn Citizen's United!

I know he claims he was at the top of his undergraduate class at Penn (he lies; he graduated with zero honors) but he never went to graduate school much less passed a bar exam. He never spent a day working in the legal profession to my knowledge. So all of a sudden he's an expert on the constitution and knows that the Supreme Court will overrule an entire amendment? Granted, Scalia and Thomas might sympathize with the desire to deny "anchor babies" their citizenship, maybe even Alito, but I'm not sure even they would go so far as to rule that persons born here aren't citizens. Not to mention how do you determine who to exclude? Are Canadian tourist babies ok but Latin American tourist babies not? Africans on a work study visa no, white Europeans yes? It just appalls me that this nimrod is taken seriously by so many.

It will be the worst attack on what being an American is since citizens united. If you allow corporate slaves called congress and Governors to determine who is and is not a citizen, expect mayhem. This is even worse as frankly, unless you are a First nations member, you have no business saying who is American. And to those the fear Latinos, do remember who has been on this land long before England sent any ships.

As far as mass deports, oh yes, many want it, then again at the risk of Godwin;'s law, a lot of people never thought that idiot from Bavaria would have ever been able to deport Jews.

The 14th Amendment says (in relevant part):

"Section 1. 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 purpose of this was to make former slaves citizens.

Now, look at the phase "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof."

Case law, and history is clear that this DOES NOT INCLUDE: (1) children of hostile soldiers born in the USA; (2) children of diplomats.

It could also include, by statute (i.e., Congress) children of undocumented immigrants, in that said immigrants remain subject to the jurisdiction of their home countries.

The case law is extremely muddy, with the closest example being children of legal immigrants (i.e., "green card" immigrants) being citizens.

But, yes, the law can be changed.

So Trump is theoretically correct, in a ain't-gonna-happen sorta way, as it would take 60 votes and the President to sign a law.

Read Justice Gray's opinion in Wong Kim Ark. He explains the history and the law quite well.

The opinion was basically a longer and better-written version of my post.

And Trump obliges...

Cruz, Rubio, Jindal among others. The GOP needs to realize they've got beneficiaries of the 14th Amendment within their own party.

Effing fascists.

Build a gigantic wall to make Americans think they are under siege. Pledge to round up and deport 11 million people asap and shove them across into Mexico. Ignore the fact that we have "illegals" from across the globe living here; just shove them into Mexico. Include their American children ("we'll keep the families together&quot .

Somehow I think this proposal is going to make the Trail of Tears look like a small act of genocide by comparison.

those tea parties gotta be stupid crazy! What a maroon!

If the law could be so twisted as to retroactively rob Americans of their citizenship because their parent's were illegal when they were born here, couldn't the same messed up interpretation take away a person's citizenship if their grandparents were illegal, or their great grandparents?

Better watch out, Bill O'Reilly and Shawn Hannity -- next they come for you!!!