The President of the United States, Donald Trump, has signed a new executive order aimed at curbing the entry into the country of foreign women traveling to give birth on U.S. soil, with the goal that their children —and, eventually, themselves— obtain nationality by birth. The leader has described this practice as "maternity tourism." The decision comes just over a month after the Supreme Court overturned a previous directive along the same lines.
"Citizenship is not a commodity that can be acquired through calculated exploitation and evasion of immigration laws, such as, for example, entering the United States on a non-immigrant visa for the purpose of giving birth within the borders of the Nation," argues the text of the order, released by the White House.
In the document, the Trump Administration denounces the alleged activity of "maternity tourism operators" who would resort to "misleading advertising and incentives to attract foreign citizens to travel to the United States for the purpose of giving birth on U.S. soil."
According to the order, these intermediaries would take advantage of "temporary non-immigrant visas (...) for studies, exchanges, temporary employment, tourism, and other transitory activities" with the ultimate intention of "establishing permanent residence in the United States, thereby securing the advantage of citizenship for their children and, potentially, for themselves."
The text maintains that "maternity tourism (...) undermines the integrity of the nation's immigration system by allowing foreign citizens to exploit their temporary admission to obtain permanent immigration benefits."
In this context, the Republican leader defends a strategy aimed at "promoting the integrity of its immigration system, ensuring that non-immigrant visa classifications are used solely for their legal and intended purposes, and preventing the exploitation of such classifications by individuals engaged in maternity tourism."
The specific order characterizes this phenomenon as "the entry of any foreign citizen to the United States through a non-immigrant visa for the purpose of giving birth on U.S. territory," or "any effort by a foreign citizen to facilitate the entry of any other foreign citizen to the United States through a non-immigrant visa for the purpose of giving birth on U.S. territory."
To implement the new policy, Trump delegates its execution to the Secretaries of State, Marco Rubio, and of Homeland Security, Todd Blanche, who "will adopt the necessary measures and update the rules, policies, operational guidelines, or other guidelines that are relevant to enforce the established policy."
The range of planned actions includes denying entry to those attempting to access for this purpose, as well as the withdrawal of the visa and the permanent ban on entry, in addition to the expulsion of "any foreigner who has participated" in such processes. It also contemplates "appropriate sanctions against entities, organizations, or individuals, inside or outside the United States, responsible for facilitating or allowing maternity tourism."
The document includes a section on exemptions stating that, "without prejudice to the restrictions imposed by this order, the Secretary of State or the Secretary of Homeland Security may exempt a foreign citizen from the measures adopted under this order for humanitarian reasons or when their entry is in the national interest, as determined."
With this initiative, the occupant of the White House attempts again to cut back the scope of the right to citizenship for those born in the United States, where the principle of jus solis prevails, as opposed to the more widespread principle in Europe, jus sanguinis. The order is presented just over a month after the Supreme Court annulled its previous directive to end birthright citizenship, issued on the first day of its second term, considering that it violated the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution.
That attempt sought to deny U.S. citizenship to the children of mothers present in the country in an irregular situation or with temporary visas, whose parents were not citizens or legal residents. If applied, it could have affected about 250,000 babies born each year in the United States, according to estimates from the Migration Policy Institute (MPI) and the Population Research Institute at the University of Pennsylvania.