Will Donald Trump strip the automatic right to American citizenship?
Donald Trump has promised to make changes to the 14th Amendment to end automatic citizenship rights, but will he be able to make this happen?
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In brief…
- Trump presented a “very different” version of himself in a new interview with NBC this week, although his words were still full of threats – including ending automatic citizenship.
- The News Agents say he will struggle to get this through Congress, and may need to resort to an executive order, and sign it through himself.
- There have already been “hardline” promises to deport families, and potentially young people who already hold US passports.
What’s the story?
It was a "dialled-back" version of Donald Trump who appeared on NBC this week for his first mainstream media appearance since winning the November election.
He spoke with Kristen Welker on the channel's Meet The Press series, where he spoke about his plans to end citizenship rights granted to anyone born in the US, as well as jailing key people involved in prosecuting rioters in the Jan 6 Capitol riot of 2021.
But The News Agents say he presented a more toned-down, restrained Donald Trump that the world may be used to.
He spoke about uniting America, and appealing to people who did not vote for him as well – a marked shift from the combative stance he presented through the election campaign.
The words were still full of threats, he just delivered them more calmly, and more measured than before.
"It's not Fox, it's not Newsmax, it's not an American news network. This is mainstream. And he subjected himself to an hour of questions," says Jon Sopel.
Emily Maitlis says it's difficult to know what this change in Trump's public persona means as the world has seen "so many iterations" of the MAGA leader.
What is Trump planning on citizenship, and will he pull it off?
There are an estimated 11 million undocumented migrants living in America. Donald Trump has promised to start mass deportations from day one of his presidency.
He has also promised to end rights, set out in the 14th amendment, that anyone born in the US is granted US citizenship. But changing the constitution could be where Trump struggles.
"He's probably not going to get Congress to sign that off," says Emily.
Describing Congress as the "smart, grown up" way of making this change, she suggests he could instead bypass this procedure and push it through with an executive action, which a president can sign off on alone.
"It would be a monumental change for the US Constitution," she adds.
"The whole idea of the Statue of Liberty is that once you make it to those shores, if you are born on those shores, you are American.
"Trump is saying, we're done with that."
Jon Sopel says it's the children of undocumented migrants, who will have both citizenship and US passports, that will cause issues for Trump.
"Do you deport them? You can't deport people who've got US passports. They're legitimately there," he says.
Emily says the Trump administration has already made it clear it will be "hardline" on this policy.
"His spokesman has already said it's up to parents to decide. You can take them with you, or you can leave them here."
What's The News Agents' take?
Jon Sopel says Trump's plans will result in a "massive family separation policy" – if it even happens.
"With so much to do with Donald Trump, the details are not yet worked out," he says.
"They know what the direction of travel is, and the direction of travel is south of the border.
"How it is executed is still anyone's guess, and that's why you judge Trump not by what he says, but by what he does."
And in terms of how Trump presented himself in the NBC interview, he says it "all feels very different".
Although, he adds, Trump is still out for revenge – it just might be a slightly different revenge to the one people might have expected.
"There was something else he said, which I thought was so interesting, and showed someone very different from Donald Trump 1.0, which was he said he's looking to make our country successful, and not looking to go back to the past.
"In other words, I will have my revenge on the Democrats by being more successful than they were when they were running this country."