President Donald Trump says he plans to sign an executive order that would remove the automatic right to citizenship for babies of non-citizens and unauthorised immigrants born on US soil.
In an interview with Axios, the US president said the process to end birthright citizenship by executive order is under way.
If Trump executes this plan, Nigerians who usually travel to America to give birth would be affected.
The US president has been taking an increasingly hard-line stance on immigration.
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“It was always told to me you need a constitutional amendment. Guess what, you don’t,” Trump told Axios, a news website.
“You can definitely do it with an act of Congress, but now they’re saying I can do it just with an executive order. It’s in the process. It’ll happen.
“Now how ridiculous, we’re the only country in the world where a person comes in, has a baby, and the baby is essentially a citizen of the United States for 85 years with all of those benefits. It’s ridiculous, it’s ridiculous and it has to end.”
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Chris Coons, a US senator, said Trump “was driving a false narrative on immigration” in many ways to stoke fear.
The 14th amendment allows for “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”.
In 1898, the US Supreme Court reaffirmed the right of citizenship to children born to legal permanent residents.
But conservatives say that right should not apply to everyone, including immigrants in the country illegally or those with temporary legal status.
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