A Seattle federal judge blasted President Trump’s day one executive order doing away with birthright citizenship Thursday, calling the action “blatantly unconstitutional.”
Senior US District Judge John Coughenour made the decision to block the 47th president’s order after hearing arguments in a lawsuit brought by four Democrat-led states — Washington, Arizona, Illinois and Oregon.
President Donald Trump holds former U.S. President Biden’s letter on the day he issues executive orders and pardons for January 6 defendants in the Oval Office at the White House on Inauguration Day in Washington, U.S., January 20, 2025. REUTERS
“This is blatantly unconstitutional order,” U.S. District Judge John Coughenour told a lawyer with the U.S. Justice Department defending Trump’s order. REUTERS“I am having trouble understanding how a member of the bar could state unequivocally that this order is constitutional,” Coughenour, appointed to the bench by President Ronald Reagan, told Justice Department lawyer Brett Shumate, defending Trump’s action. “It just boggles my mind.”
“I’ve been on the bench for over four decades. I can’t remember another case where the question presented is as clear as this one,” the judge added before issuing a 14-day temporary restraining order while he considers whether to follow with a preliminary injunction. “This is a blatantly unconstitutional order.”
The lawsuit was one of five filed since Trump, 78, declared Monday that children born in the US to illegal immigrants after Feb. 19 are no longer automatically American citizens.
Challengers of the executive order say Trump’s action violates the right granted by the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment, which provides anyone born in the United States with citizenship. Bloomberg via Getty Images
Opponents of the order have argued that it violates the 14th Amendment, which begins: “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.”
“Under this order, babies being born today don’t count as US citizens,” Washington state Assistant Attorney General Lane Polozola argued earlier in the hearing to a full courtroom of spectators.
Trump in his executive order refuses to recognize the citizenship of children born in the country if neither their mother nor father is a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident. AFP via Getty ImagesIf Trump’s order is allowed to stand, it could affect some 150,000 children born each year in the US who would not be afforded citizenship, the states argued.
Trump’s lawyers fired back in court papers Wednesday night, claiming Trump’s order is a critical part of his plan to “address this nation’s broken immigration system and the ongoing crisis at the southern border.”
The other four lawsuits opposing the birthright citizenship order are still pending in other courts.
From the Oval Office Thursday afternoon, Trump said he planned to fight Judge Coughenour’s decision.
“Obviously, we’ll appeal it,” the president said. “They put it before a certain judge, in, Seattle, I guess, right? And, uh, there’s no surprises with that judge.”
With Post wires
