LOS ANGELES (KTLA)—California Attorney General Rob Bonta and 18 other state attorneys general have issued a statement after another judge blocked President Trump’s executive order seeking to terminate birthright citizenship.
“President Trump may believe that he is above the law, but today’s preliminary injunction sends a clear message: He is not a king, and he cannot rewrite the Constitution with the stroke of a pen,” the statement said in part.
U.S. District Judge Leo Sorokin, who sits on the federal district court in Massachusetts, said that 19 states, the District of Columbia, and two nonprofit organizations are likely to prevail on the merits of their claims.
In January, California joined a lawsuit against Trump’s executive order.
Bonta pointed to the case of Wong Kim Ark, a San Francisco-born son of Chinese immigrants, who sued all the way to the Supreme Court in 1898 when his citizenship was challenged when he tried to return home from a trip abroad.
That case set a precedent for establishing birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment.
In his opinion, Sorokin noted that the administration could revisit the case but that would be a matter for the Supreme Court.
