The Chamberlain Network Files Amicus Brief Defending Birthright Citizenship

Atlanta, GA - The Chamberlain Network has filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court in Trump v. Barbara (No. 25-365), urging the Court to reject the administration’s attempt to narrow birthright citizenship by executive order. Executive Order 14160, (the “Citizenship Stripping Order”) is irreconcilable with the text, structure, and settled meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause.

Why we filed. 

This case is about whether a president, via fiat, can hollow out one of the Constitution’s clearest guarantees. He cannot. The Citizenship Clause was written to settle the question of birthright citizenship and to anchor equal membership in the nation on birth in the United States, not on ancestry or parentage.

The Constitution is clear. The Fourteenth Amendment provides that all persons born in the United States and subject to its jurisdiction are citizens of the United States and of the state where they reside. That guarantee is unequivocal and without qualification.

What’s at stake.

Birthright citizenship is fundamental to democratic equality. It secures equal membership in the polity from birth. It is the legal foundation for political freedom, civic participation, and access to the institutions and protections of public life. The Fourteenth Amendment does not permit the federal government to create disfavored classes among people born in this country.

The Citizenship Stripping Order threatens more than individual citizenship status. It attacks the constitutional foundations of representative government itself. Citizenship shapes who belongs to the political community. It bears directly on representation, participation, and the government’s obligation to serve the whole people. Stripping citizenship from U.S.-born children would undermine equal representation, distort the census data used for reapportionment and redistricting, and impair the administration of public programs that rely on accurate population counts.

Veterans have served to defend a constitutional order grounded in equality before the law and a government accountable to the people. Military service has long been treated in American law and practice as a path toward fuller membership in the polity. The Citizenship Stripping Order would deny that membership to people born on American soil and foreclose rights and duties that the Fourteenth Amendment secures from birth.

We urge the Court to affirm the district court’s judgment and strike down the Citizenship Stripping Order. The district court correctly held that the order cannot be squared with the Fourteenth Amendment’s command that citizenship turns on birth in the United States, not on the immigration status of a child’s parents.

As said in our brief:

“In sum, there is no constitutional tradition in this country that can abide the distinctions and degradations that the Citizenship Stripping Order would mandate into law and civic life.”

Read the brief here:The Chamberlain Network amicus brief in Trump v. Barbara

We are proud to join alongside Secure Families Initiative, Black Veterans Project, and the Foreign-Born Military Spouse Network in this filing.