Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett triggered fierce backlash from MAGA loyalists after forcefully questioning the Trump administration’s top lawyer and voicing skepticism over ending birthright citizenship during a heated Supreme Court argument.
Since taking office, Donald Trump has pushed for an executive order to end birthright citizenship, a constitutional guarantee under the 14th Amendment that grants automatic U.S. citizenship to anyone born on American soil.
During oral arguments, Barrett confronted Solicitor General Dean John Sauer, who was representing the Trump administration, over his dismissive response to Justice Elena Kagan’s concerns. Barrett sharply asked whether Sauer truly believed there was “no way” for plaintiffs to quickly challenge the executive order, suggesting that class-action certification might expedite the process.
Yes, I have been misreading your argument, but I think it’s a bit academic. You are arguing that if the government were to argue that these people were not subject to US law, in an attempt to give itself free rein to abuse them, it would undermine itself by leaving them legally untouchable so it couldn’t do anything to them. Legally that may be true, but practically the government is showing its intention to take extrajudicial action against them (like kidnapping them and trafficking them to foreign prison camps) and the law of the USA is the only thing protecting people from this treatment. So if US law didn’t apply to them they’d end up open to any kind of abuse by the US government.
In any case, illegals, invaders and terrorists are subject to US law when they’re in the USA, and that confers rights on them. That’s why the USA used Guantanamo Bay and black sites around the world to avoid having to bring people to the USA where they’d be under the protection of US law and the rights it confers. So if the US government attempted to make any legal argument that US law doesn’t apply to these people while they’re in the USA, it would be quite obviously wrong.
Right. The law is academic. I’m not saying they couldn’t shoot them dead in the street. We all know the government doesn’t always follow the law. I’m simply saying that’s the legal problem that would be created as a result of changing the interpretation of that clause, and therefore an unreasonable interpretation for a court to make.