• elbucho@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    I am not confused about the intent. The intent is pretty clear. What I’m confused about is the legal argument. The reason I am confused is that he is trying to eliminate birthright citizenship; that means that the defendants are all of the people born in the United States to two non-citizen parents. Which also means that his legal argument is that the act of being born under these circumstances on US land means that you are not subject to the jurisdiction of the US, which puts you into the role of diplomat or enemy combatant. So unless he’s trying to say that US-born babies of non-citizens are diplomats of their parents’ respective countries… the only possible interpretation is that they are foot soldiers of some invading army.

    Which brings me back to the point of showcasing how utterly ridiculous that argument is, and why I am confident that any functional supreme court would laugh the case out of the building.

    • Rivalarrival@lemmy.today
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      7 hours ago

      You’re not confused. You’re thinking too deep.

      This is the birthright citizenship clause:

      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.

      This is the entirety of what he cares about:

      subject to the jurisdiction thereof

      That’s it. He doesn’t care about any other part of the 14th amendment. He doesn’t care whether the kids are citizens or not. Nothing about those kids is relevant at all. The ruling he wants is entirely on those five words.

      Ruled in his favor, those five words give him everything he needs to start a shooting war on the southern border.