Senator Proposes Constitutional Amendment to Combat ‘Birth Tourism’
A few Republican senators jumped on board the bandwagon when Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said he’d like to amend the 14th Amendment that gives automatic citizenship to children born here, even illegal immigrants.
Graham proposed changing the amendment to discourage “birth tourists” who travel to the United States to give birth so the children can acquire citizenship, according to the New York Times and the Washington Post. “We can’t just have people swimming across the river having children here—that’s chaos,” Graham said in a Fox News interview posted by Mediaite.
The proposal spurred Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and other prominent Republicans to call for hearings on birth tourism. But the Post says that, despite the publicity, the issue “is almost assuredly going nowhere.”
The Post quotes Jon Feere, legal policy analyst for the Center for Immigration Studies, who said the debate isn’t worth the political capital. Energy is better spent reducing illegal immigration, he said, which would eliminate the problem of birthright citizenship.
The amendment was adopted to ensure citizenship for the children of slaves, the Times says. It reads: “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.” Some have argued the amendment does not grant citizenship to the children of illegal immigrants because the parents are not under U.S. jurisdiction. The U.S. Supreme Court has disagreed, however.
