NJ attorney general challenges his move to end birthright citizenship
By: Katie Sobko
NorthJersey.com
USA Today Network - New Jersey
..... New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin has announced a lawsuit to challenge the constitutionally of President Donald Trump's executive order that seeks to end birthright citizenship.
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"When President Trump was elected November 5, [2025] I made it clear my hope is that he would act in ways that were in the best interest of our communities, of our residents, of our neighbors, of our friends," Platkin said Tuesday. [01/21/2025] "I made it equally clear that as the attorney general for the state of New Jersey, I would stand up for the rule of law and for the rights of our residents."
..... Platkin said New Jersey - along with 17 other states, the District of Columbia and the city of San Francisco - is challenging the executive order ending birthright citizenship, singed just hours after Trump was sworn in.
..... The attorney general said the executive order is an "assault on the rule of law" and "attacks a right that is core to our nation's earliest days."
..... "The birthright citizenship clause in the 14th Amendment followed the only brief period in American history where the descendants of slaves were held not to be American citizens," Platkin said. "This isn't just an attack on the law. It's an attack on the very fabric of this nation, this diverse nation, a nation of immigrants."
..... Trump had mentioned moving forward with an order to end birthright citizenship while on the campaign trail.
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The lawsuit is being filed in the U.S. District Court of the District of Massachusetts and seeks to invalidate the executive order and to stop any actions taken to implement it. The suit requests both a preliminary injunction to prevent the order from being acted on.
..... Governor Phil Murphy said in a statement Tuesday [01/21/2025] that the "constitution could not be more clear: citizenship of children born in the United States does not depend on the citizenship of their parents."
..... "That principle is fundamental to who we are as a nation and what it means to be an American," Murphy said. "Yesterday's [01/20/2025] announcement about birthright citizenship flouts the Constitution and will needlessly harm families who are lawfully present in the United States until it is inevitably overturned by the courts. We will not waver in our efforts to protect the rights of all who call New Jersey home."
..... The order would mean thousands of babies born each year in New Jersey who otherwise would have been citizens would no longer enjoy the privileges and benefits of citizenship, such as access to Social Services and gainful employment and there right to vote, serve on juries and run for certain offices.
..... The suit says the order would also harm states, which stand to lose federal funding to programs that they administer, such as Medicaid, the Children's Health Insurance Program and foster-care and adoption assistance programs.
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States joining Platkin in Tuesday's [01/21/2025] filing include California, Massachusetts, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin, as well as the District of Columbia and San Francisco.
Other opposition
..... This coalition of states isn't the only opposition to this executive order. A collection of advocacy groups led by the American Civil Liberties Union field a federal lawsuit late Monday [01/20/2025] challenging it as well.
..... Anthony Romero, ACLU executive director, said in a statement
that "denying citizenship to U.S.-born children is not only unconstitutional - it's also a reckless and ruthless repudiation of American values.""This order seeks to repeal one of the gravest errors in American history, by creating a permanent subclass of people born in the U.S. who are denied fill rights as Americans," Romero said
..... Trump's order would take effect in the next 30 days and directs the Social Security Administration no longer to recognize the children as citizens and the State Department to stop issuing them passports.
Katie Sobko covers the New Jersey Statehouse. Email: sobko@northjersy.com.