Trump faces widespread criticism for his decision to end birthright citizenship

TIL Desk/World/Jakarta/ US President Donald Trump’s decision to bring an executive order to end the right to the US citizenship for children born in the US to non-citizens has invited widespread criticism, even from his own party.

In his latest hardline immigration rhetoric ahead of the midterm congressional elections, Trump, in an interview with Axios, has said birthright citizenship “has to end” and that it would “with an executive order.” “You cannot end the birthright citizenship with an executive order,” said Congressman Paul Ryan, Speaker of the US House of Representatives.

“We didn’t like it when (former President) Obama tried changing immigration laws via executive action, and obviously as conservatives, we believe in the Constitution,” Ryan told a local radio station in Lexington, Kentucky. Under the current laws, anyone born in the US irrespective of the nationality of parents, automatically becomes an American citizen.

“It was always told to me that you needed a constitutional amendment, one amendment. You don’t have to do it. Number one. Number two, you can definitely do it with an act of Congress. But now they are saying, I can do it just with an executive order,” Trump told Axios in an interview.