People hold a sign as they participate in a protest outside the U.S. Supreme Court over President Donald Trump’s move to end birthright citizenship as the court hears arguments over the order in Washington, May 15, 2025.
Drew Angerer | Afp | Getty Images
President Donald Trump’s effort to curtail birthright citizenship was declared unconstitutional by a second U.S. appeals court on Friday, handing him another defeat on a core piece of his hardline immigration agenda whose ultimate fate may lay with the U.S. Supreme Court.
A three-judge panel of the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld an injunction won by Democratic-led states and immigrant rights advocates that stopped the Republican president’s executive order from taking effect.
Trump’s order, issued on his first day back in office on January 20, directs agencies to refuse to recognize the citizenship of U.S.-born children who do not have at least one parent who is an American citizen or lawful permanent resident, also known as a “green card” holder.
The principle of birthright citizenship has been recognized in the U.S. for more than 150 years, deriving from the 14th Amendment that states that anyone born in the United States is considered a citizen.
Another appeals court, the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in July similarly upheld a nationwide injunction blocking Trump’s order from taking effect on the grounds that it violated the citizenship clause of the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment.
The administration last week asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear its appeal in that case and a related one. If the Supreme Court agrees, it would mark the second time the litigation is before the high court, after its 6-3 conservative majority in June limited the power of judges to block that and other actions by Trump on a nationwide basis.
The Supreme Court at that time did not weigh in on the validity of Trump’s birthright citizenship order. But in three cases where judges had declared it unconstitutional, the court limited the ability of judges to issue so-called universal injunctions and directed lower courts that had blocked Trump’s policy nationally to reconsider the scope of their orders.
The Supreme Court’s ruling opened the door to Trump’s order taking effect in parts of the country, fueling uncertainty for immigrants and states grappling with the implications of a potentially patchwork system of citizenship rules. Yet in the months since, lower-court judges have repeatedly blocked it from being implemented anywhere in the country.
The 1st Circuit was reviewing a ruling by U.S. District Judge Leo Sorokin in Boston, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, who ruled in favor of 18 Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia in February.
After the Supreme Court’s June ruling, he reaffirmed his original decision to halt the policy nationwide.
He said a patchwork approach to citizenship would generate confusion, given the substantial movement of noncitizen parents and children between states and the impact Trump’s order would have on administering social services to them.
