By Akemi Tamanaha
On Monday, the California State Assembly passed a resolution to support birthright citizenship. The Assembly also honored the descendants of the man whose Supreme Court case established birthright citizenship: Wong Kim Ark.
The Trump administration has repeatedly threatened to revoke birthright citizenship, which gives anyone born in the United States a legal right to U.S. citizenship. In January, he issued an executive order to restrict it. According to Reuters, more than 150,000 babies would be denied citizenship if the executive order takes effect.
Assembly Joint Resolution 5 declares the California State Legislature’s opposition to the executive order and affirms its support for birthright citizenship.
Chinese for Affirmative Action, one of the several civil rights organizations supporting the resolution, estimates that 24,500 babies in California would “be relegated to an underclass without full rights as American citizens if Trump’s unlawful order were to go into effect.”
Several California lawmakers spoke in support of the resolution on Monday, during a State Assembly floor vote.
“If birthright citizenship was not the law of the land at the time my birth, I may not have been a citizen many of us here and many of my constituents who come from mixed status households, whether they be on legal visas or they’re undocumented, would not become citizens,” State Assemblymember Alex Lee said.
Lawmakers questioned how the Trump administration planned to enforced the executive order. Assemblymember Ash Kalra suggested that the administration would not be consistent.
“And let’s be clear, like so many other long-standing rights that are enjoyed as Americans by overturning it, the federal administration is not going to overturn it for everyone. It will become selective, as it was prior to the 14th Amendment, where winners and losers were chosen oftentimes based on the color of their skin or what country they were immigrating from,” Assemblymember Kalra said.
The resolution was passed in a 61-1 vote with 60 Democrats and one Republican voting in support. One Republican voted against the measure and 17 Assembly members did not vote at all.
In a social media post, Chinese for Affirmative Action expressed with AAPI Assemblymembers Philip Chen, Tri Ta, and David Tangipa for abstaining.
After the vote, the Assembly honored Wong Kim Ark and his descendants Ark was born in San Francisco in 1873. In November 1884, he sailed to China to temporarily visit family. When he returned in August of 1895 he was denied re-entry. He was forced to live on steamships for five months off the coast of San Francisco while his case was being determined.
Ark’s great-grandson Norman Wong and his wife Maureen Wong were welcomed at the Assembly on Monday.
“Together to this day, they are still Champions for Change, progress and liberation for all,” Assemblymember Lee said.
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