Fact check: What the dishonest fake news establishment media gets wrong about â€œbirthright citizenshipâ€ and the 14th Amendment

(National Sentinel)Â Unconstitutional:Â We would wager that before news broke last week that POTUSÂ Donald TrumpÂ was considering an executive order to end so-called â€œbirthright citizenshipâ€ â€“ the granting of automatic citizenship to anyone born on U.S. soil, including illegal immigrants â€“ maybe 1-in-5 Americans knew this occurs in our country on a regular basis.

The 14thÂ Amendment, ratified in the aftermath of the Civil War, â€œaddresses many aspects of citizenship,â€Â Cornell Law Schoolâ€™s Legal Information Institute notes. One of them addresses birthright, and it is contained in the first sentence of Section 1 of the amendment:

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.

Many people believe this passage makes it clear that anyone who is born in the United States, regardless of how it happens, is automatically a U.S. citizen. And thatâ€™s been U.S. policy since about the 1960s or 1970s.

But there are some who believe the phrase â€œand subject to the jurisdiction thereofâ€ makes it equally clear that if a mother is inside the U.S. illegally and is a non-citizen, they are not subject to U.S. jurisdiction, they are subject to the jurisdiction of their home countries (because they themselves are not U.S. citizens). Therefore, their offspring cannot be automatically deemed a citizen.

In fact, at the time the amendment was authored, Sen. Jacob Howard of Michigan, who introduced the â€˜jurisdictionâ€™ language adopted within the amendment,Â made it clearÂ that it should include â€œa full and complete jurisdiction,â€ â€œthe same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now.â€



