A US federal judge blocked the Trump administration on Wednesday from enforcing a new executive order limiting who qualifies for birthright citizenship.
The move thwarts President Donald Trump's latest attempt to restrict the constitutional right, which comes after the US Supreme Court rejected his previous effort.
US District Judge Deborah Boardman of Maryland issued a preliminary injunction following an appeal by rights groups who challenged Trump's executive order from 6 August targeting what he termed "birth tourism."
"The Supreme Court has spoken: Children in the certified class are 'citizens at birth'," Boardman wrote in her 35-page ruling, adding the president's August order "is almost certainly unconstitutional."
Immigrant rights groups cheered the decision.
"When it comes to attacking birthright citizenship, the Trump administration has lost before this court, lost before the Supreme Court, and lost again today," said Shana Khader, Legal Director at We Are CASA, a Maryland-based group.
Trump's latest executive order was aimed at those who he alleges enter the country under the guise of tourism while actually intending to give birth.
In his first executive order on the issue, Trump said that children born to parents in the United States illegally or on temporary visas would not automatically become US citizens.
Lower courts blocked that move, ruling that under the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution, nearly everyone born on US soil is an American citizen. The Supreme Court agreed.
The administration's attorneys argued that the request to block the order was premature and said the federal agencies tasked with enforcing it would use “appropriate measures” to do so, relying on official guidance that hasn't been issued yet.
The judge rejected that argument.
“No matter what the guidance says, the 2026 Executive Order commands agencies to deny citizenship documents to several broad categories of children,” Boardman wrote.
“The White House must recognise it will not succeed in stripping children of their right to citizenship, evading binding court decisions or placing the president’s anti-immigrant agenda above the Constitution,” said Khader in a prepared statement.
The president's efforts to curb birthright citizenship are part of his wider campaign to limit immigration, which includes expelling millions of undocumented migrants and removing deportation protections from nationals of more than a dozen countries.
