Birthright citizenship is established in the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution – yet Donald Trump’s recent Executive Order 14160 denies some types of birthright citizenship. The Order contradicts over a century of American law, legal practice, and constitutional interpretation. Three groups have opposed the order as unconstitutional and challenged it in the courts: and cities, civil rights organizations, and labor organizations. In the podcast, three scholars to help Susan and Lilly interrogate the meaning of natural born citizenship, the political ramifications of Trump’s order, and the complicated history of natural born citizenship in the United States.

Dr. Anna O. Law is the Herbert Kurz Chair in Constitutional Rights and Associate Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College, City University of New York.

Julie Novkov is Dean of Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy and Professor of Political Science and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, University at Albany, SUNY.

Carol Nackenoff is the Emerita Richter Professor of Political Science, Swarthmore College

Mentioned:

• Calvin’s Case (1608)
• Donald Trump’s Executive order 14160
• Julie and Carol’s 2021 book American by Birth: Wong Kim Ark and the Battle for Citizenship and their NBN interview with Susan.
• Anna’s 2025 FREE open-access article “The Civil War and Reconstruction Amendments’ Effects on Citizenship and Migration”
• Anna’s NBN conversation with Heath Brown on her 2017 book, The Immigration Battle in American Courts
• Lilly’s conversation with Martha Jones about her book, Birthright Citizens: A History of Race and Rights in Antebellum America
• Kate Masur, Until Justice Be Done: America’s First Civil Rights Movement, from Revolution to Reconstruction (2021)
• Lilly’s NBN conversation with Elizabeth Cohen and Cyril Ghosh about their 2019 book Citizenship

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