CAPS TV Spot, New Website Promote Ending Birthright Citizenship

Californians for Population Stabilization will air a new TV spot during the Democratic presidential debate today. Designed to help Americans understand what presidential candidates mean when they talk about anchor babies and where they stand on granting automatic citizenship to everyone born on U.S. soil, the spot is scheduled to air multiple times on CNN across major markets in Iowa, South Carolina and California.

New CAPS ad calls for end to birthright citizenship.

More than 300,000 babies are born in the U.S. to illegal immigrants each year, about 8 percent of all domestic births. Pew Hispanic Research estimates there are more than 4 million children living in the U.S. today who were born in the U.S. to illegal immigrants. This contrasts with 2000 when there were less than 2.2 million U.S.-born children younger than 18 living with at least one unauthorized parent.

Under current policy, when a foreign national gives birth to a child on U.S. soil, whether present as a tourist on a nonimmigrant visa or illegally, the child automatically gets citizenship along with taxpayer-funded benefits. Automatic citizenship allows the parents to eventually become eligible for U.S. citizenship and benefits. Then, through what’s known as chain migration, the parents’ extended families can apply for citizenship. In the end, aliens who have knowingly and voluntarily broken U.S. immigration laws are rewarded with U.S. citizenship and taxpayer-funded benefits for not only them, but also for their children and their extended families, a system that’s harmful to Americans.

Several presidential candidates have called for an end to birthright citizenship, citing constitutional scholars who say the current policy fundamentally misinterprets the citizenship clause in the 14^th Amendment:

“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and the State wherein they reside.”

The expansive interpretation of the 14^th Amendment has spawned the devious birth tourism industry wherein wealthy foreign citizens pay large sums to deliver a baby in the U.S. so that they can later, if they choose, return the child to the U.S. to attend school.

The U.S. and Canada are the only two developed nations that still allow birthright citizenship. Other developed countries including Japan, France and Germany ended the practice decades ago. The U.S. should join them. See the complete list of nations that no longer grant birthright citizenship here.

The Birthright Citizenship Act, H.R. 140, would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act, not the Constitution, to define persons born in the U.S. as “subject to the jurisdiction” of the U. S. for automatic citizenship purposes if one of his parents is (1) a U.S. citizen or national, (2) a lawful permanent resident alien whose residence is in the U.S. or (3) an alien performing active service in the U.S. Armed Forces.

Read the CAPS press release here; listen to the new radio ad here, and view the TV spot at USAnchorBabies.org, where you can see where presidential candidates stand on birthright citizenship and also sign a petition telling them that illegal immigrants should not be able to anchor themselves in America by having children.