Proposed 28th Amendment to the United States Constitution
Section 1: This Amendment seeks to amend and repeal a portion of Section 1 of the 14th Amendment. The portion of the Amendment to be repealed consists of: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State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.”
Section 2: The Constitution shall be amended to reflect that: “All persons born to at least one legally naturalized citizen of the United States are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
The concept of jus soli (“right of the soil”) is now null and void and shall not be used when interpreting or enforcing Federal or State immigration or citizenship law.
An amendment will never happen. However, the amendment could be interpreted based on the language of ‘Subject to the jurisdiction thereof’.
The current implementation of the 14th Amendment makes no sense with that piece in there. Currently, citizenship is given to all persons “born or naturalized in the United States” without exception. What does “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” mean? Has any one single person ever been denied citizenship based on that, who was otherwise ‘born or naturalized’?
That language is there for a reason, and the Supreme Court has never addressed it.
I would argue that it is CRITICAL that not only this be tested before the Supreme Court, but that its provision should be implemented retroactively 18 years, and all minors who only have citizenship through birth and not from parents who are “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” be stripped of citizenship as well (that means ‘anchor babies’ have to leave).