Barbara McQuade, Columnist

Why Trump Can’t Just End Birthright Citizenship

There are numerous roadblocks, starting with the Constitution.

December 12, 2024 at 10:30 AM UTC

Barbara McQuade is a professor at the University of Michigan Law school, a former US attorney and author of the forthcoming book, "The Fix: Saving America from the Corruption of a Mob-Style Government."

Can citizenship be revoked?
Photographer: Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images

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Donald Trump knows that in politics, sometimes you can win by losing.

After making immigration reform a focus of his campaign, Trump, in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” promised to end birthright citizenship, calling the concept “ridiculous.” Perhaps the president-elect disfavors citizenship for people born in the US as a matter of policy, but eliminating a legal right guaranteed by the Constitution is a tall order. Even so, it may be that Trump believes that an aggressive stance on immigration is what matters most.