Ranking Member Khanna Responds to Trump’s Attacks on Birthright Citizenship

WASHINGTON – Today, Representative Ro Khanna (CA-17), Ranking Member of the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, issued the following statement in response to the Trump Administration’s attempts to end birthright citizenship. 

“Today, the Supreme Court will hear arguments on President Trump’s executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship, denying it for those born in the US to parents in the country undocumented or temporarily. I was born in Philly in 1976, and my parents were immigrants holding green cards. While they wouldn't have been affected by Trump's executive order limiting birthright citizenship, this is deeply personal. My parents have long said I won the lottery by being born in America.

In United States v. Wong Kim Ark (1898), the case of a child born in the United States to Chinese immigrant parents, the Supreme Court made crystal clear the Fourteenth Amendment ‘affirms the ancient and fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the territory.’ The Court’s opinion came amid racist, anti-Chinese attacks that grew in the 19th century. Now, pro-Trump lawyers are resurrecting that hate to try to restrict every person’s right to birthright citizenship.

For centuries, Chinese Americans have helped build this country. From workers on the transcontinental railroad to particle physicist Chien-Shiung Wu, to architect I.M. Pei, thousands of Chinese Americans have contributed immeasurably to our nation’s innovation, culture, and success. Continuing to attract immigrant contributions is paramount to American exceptionalism. 

Way back in 1869, Frederick Douglass argued passionately for Chinese immigration and for a diverse, ‘composite’ American nationality. After being enslaved for nearly twenty years, he spoke in support of a multiracial democracy including Chinese immigrants, saying ‘the fact that the Chinese and other nations desire to come and do come is a proof of their capacity for improvement and of their fitness to come.’

I am proud to work alongside groups like Stop AAPI Hate, the Asian American Scholar Forum, Asian Americans Advancing Justice, and OCA National to protect birthright citizenship, uphold American diversity, and rebuke any and all anti-immigrant hate.”