I\u2019ve been having a good-faith argument with a Trump supporter recently over whether Trump deserves to be suspected of having tyrannical ambitions. I\u2019m presenting my argument here on the off chance it might be useful to you when addressing Trump supporters in your own lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And I think a lot of Trump supporters will welcome this, too, because it\u2019s grounded in verifiable facts and not just \u201corange man bad!\u201d-style thinking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
First, let\u2019s agree that Korematsu<\/em> was an outrageous act of tyranny perpetrated by Franklin D. Roosevelt. President Roosevelt stripped millions of Americans of their core Constitutional right to live freely in exchange for obeying the law. He had precisely zero authority to do this, and not even an obsequious Supreme Court could make it right. If we can agree on this, maybe we can agree on these next definitions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Next up: birthright citizenship in the United States. Under the Fourteenth Amendment<\/a>,<\/p>\n\n\n\n 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.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Trump and his fellow citizenship-deniers like to claim that children of immigrants are not \u201csubject to the jurisdiction [of the United States],\u201d but that\u2019s, well, bullshit, and five minutes of research will reveal it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Fourteenth Amendment was enacted in 1868. Twelve years later Justice Thomas Cooley finished his law textbook, The General Principles of Constitutional Law in the United States of America<\/a><\/em>. It was published in three editions, two in 1891 and one in 1898. Quoting from the 1898 edition:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The fourteenth amendment indicates the two methods in which one may become a citizen: first, by birth in the United States; and, second, by naturalization therein. But a citizen by birth must not only be born within the United States, but he must also be subject to the jurisdiction thereof; and by this is meant that full and complete jurisdiction to which citizens generally are subject, and not any qualified and partial jurisdiction, such as may consist with allegiance to some other government. The amendment, therefore, affirms the citizenship of children born within the United States of all persons, of whatever race or color; but it does not affirm the citizenship \u201cof children of foreign sovereigns or their ministers, or born on foreign public ships, or of enemies within and during a hostile occupation of part of our territory.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Cooley\u2019s Third Edition benefitted from a very recent Supreme Court decision, Wong Kim Ark<\/a><\/em> (1898), wherein the American-born son of two Chinese nationals had his citizenship denied by the United States government on the grounds that his parentage meant he wasn\u2019t subject to our jurisdiction. SCOTUS disagreed with exceptional vigor. Since Cooley\u2019s final sentence quotes Wong Kim Ark,<\/em> we know Cooley was keeping up with the latest jurisprudence: and since Wong Kim Ark<\/em> is still the latest jurisprudence, Cooley\u2019s remarks are still on-point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Whew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So let\u2019s recap. We\u2019ve done a lot<\/em> of work defining and researching, so it\u2019s time to summarize before moving on<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now let\u2019s look at Trump. In an Axios<\/em> interview<\/a> first shown on HBO on November 4, 2018, he declared openly that he was going to end birthright citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants via executive order. He said it was in process and was going to happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
The Right to Be American<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Recap<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Trump, In His Own Words<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n