(TENNESSEE, UNITED STATES) Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti has joined 23 other state attorneys general in a late October 2025 push urging the U.S. Supreme Court to revisit the scope of birthright citizenship under the Fourteenth Amendment, asking the justices to narrow who qualifies for automatic citizenship at birth. The multistate coalition filed an amicus brief in Washington calling for the Court to clarify that children born in the United States to parents who are not lawfully present should not be granted citizenship by virtue of being born on U.S. soil. News of the coordinated filing began circulating the week of October 29, 2025, placing Tennessee at the center of a national legal effort to redraw the boundaries of a constitutional guarantee that has stood for more than a century.
The filing argues that lower courts have read the Citizenship Clause too broadly and that the Supreme Court should set a new standard based on the lawful status and domicile of parents. The amicus brief states:
“Conferring United States citizenship requires a more meaningful connection than mere presence by happenstance or illegality. That connection, originalist evidence repeatedly instructs, was parental domicile.”
By grounding their argument in what they describe as the original meaning and historical context of the Fourteenth Amendment, the 24 attorneys general contend that automatic citizenship should not extend to children of parents whose presence in the country is unauthorized.
Skrmetti’s participation signals Tennessee’s alignment with a broader legal strategy undertaken by attorneys general from across the country who want the Court to scrutinize how the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause has been applied. The coalition’s amicus brief challenges what it calls the “mere-presence” rule, which it says has been used to treat virtually every birth on U.S. soil as automatically conferring citizenship. The attorneys general argue that this approach is inconsistent with the Constitution and history, and they urge the Court to pronounce a clearer, narrower interpretation.
At the center of the legal debate is a single sentence in the Constitution: the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which reads, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States…” For decades, the Supreme Court’s 1898 ruling in United States v. Wong Kim Ark has been widely understood to guarantee citizenship to nearly all children born in the United States, with limited exceptions such as the children of foreign diplomats. The new filing contends that Wong Kim Ark does not control cases involving parents who are unlawfully present and that the decision left room for the Court to clarify the meaning of “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” when applied to such circumstances.
The amicus brief highlights long-recognized exceptions to birthright citizenship—particularly children of foreign diplomats or enemy combatants—and seeks to expand the analysis to encompass parental legal status and domicile as threshold factors. The states say that the Constitution, properly read, requires “a more meaningful connection” between the newborn and the United States than an accident of geography, and that parental domicile supplies that bond. In practical terms, the brief asks the Court to hold that children born to parents living in the country without legal status do not qualify as citizens at birth.
The timing of the filing comes as national debate has intensified over how birthright citizenship should apply amid changes in migration and enforcement policy. The attorneys general anchor their request to the Supreme Court in what they describe as the originalist understanding of the Fourteenth Amendment, laying out a historical account to argue that the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” was intended to exclude people whose parents lacked lawful ties to the country. While the brief does not ask the Court to eliminate birthright citizenship, it asks for a narrower rule that filters automatic citizenship through the lawful status and domicile of parents.
The coalition also places its argument within a series of recent policy moves, citing executive and legislative efforts that aim to restrict the grant of birthright citizenship. Those include a 2025 executive order seeking to deny citizenship to children born in the United States to parents who are unlawfully present or only temporarily authorized. The attorneys general frame their request as an opportunity for the Court to bring clarity where, they argue, lower courts have expanded the Constitution beyond its text and history.
Although the Fourteenth Amendment is one of the most familiar parts of the Constitution, litigation over its Citizenship Clause remains rare, and the breadth of the coalition—24 state attorneys general—underlines the stakes. The filing places a specific focus on how courts should treat births to parents categorized as unlawfully present, distinguishing those cases from families where parents hold lawful permanent residence or other legal status in the United States. The attorneys general say that the standard they propose would align with national sovereignty and historical practice, and would avoid granting citizenship based on what they call “mere presence.”
United States v. Wong Kim Ark is the fulcrum on which the coalition’s argument turns. For more than a century, that precedent has guided courts and agencies in treating almost all births on U.S. soil as conferring citizenship, subject to narrow exceptions. The attorneys general argue that this reading has been pushed too far and that Wong Kim Ark, properly understood, does not require citizenship when parents are unlawfully present. They ask the Court to say so explicitly, telling the justices that the absence of a clear rule has allowed lower courts to adopt a sweeping view that never accounted for parental domicile and lawful presence.
By participating in the case now before the Supreme Court, Skrmetti and the other attorneys general are seeking a definitive statement from the nation’s highest court on the reach of the Citizenship Clause. They point out that exceptions already exist in law for children of foreign diplomats and enemy combatants—categories that are not “subject to the jurisdiction” in the constitutional sense—and argue that the same principle should apply when parents are in the country in violation of immigration law. The brief’s central refrain is captured in the line:
“Conferring United States citizenship requires a more meaningful connection than mere presence by happenstance or illegality. That connection, originalist evidence repeatedly instructs, was parental domicile.”
If adopted, the coalition’s proposed standard would mark a major shift in how citizenship is assigned at birth, with ripple effects across immigration policy, family documentation, and federal and state records. The attorneys general contend that a domicile-based test would be clearer to administer and more faithful to the Constitution’s text and history. They also argue that it would harmonize with existing exceptions by focusing on a legally recognized relationship to the United States rather than geographic chance. The request, however, stops short of calling for wholesale abandonment of birthright citizenship; instead, it asks the Court to limit automatic citizenship to children whose parents have established lawful ties to the country.
The move represents one of the most ambitious coordinated state efforts in recent years to reshape constitutional doctrine around citizenship. It arrives as debates over border enforcement, asylum processing, and interior immigration policy continue to drive politics at the federal and state levels. While the attorneys general frame their case in terms of constitutional history, the immediate question before the Court is what rule to apply when a child is born in the United States to parents who are not lawfully present. The amicus brief insists that the Fourteenth Amendment’s phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” should be read to exclude such births from automatic citizenship.
For now, the Court has not announced a timetable for any decision that would address the questions raised by the attorneys general, and the coalition’s filing underscores that they are seeking guidance on a matter that affects state and federal agencies across the country. The attorneys general argue that the current approach, which recognizes citizenship in nearly every birth on U.S. soil, emerged from a misreading of precedent that overlooked the constitutional emphasis on jurisdiction and domicile. They urge the Court to adopt a rule that limits citizenship by birth to those with a defined legal connection through their parents.
The coalition’s request builds on the text of the Fourteenth Amendment and the long arc of legal interpretation that followed. The precise words—“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States…”—have anchored civil rights victories and set the baseline for membership in American society for more than 150 years. The attorneys general ask the Court to revisit how those words apply in scenarios never squarely resolved by precedent, including births to parents present without authorization. For readers seeking the exact constitutional language, the full text of the amendment is available through the National Archives’ Constitution resources.
The Tennessee-led participation emphasizes that while the issue is constitutional, its implications are practical. States issue birth certificates, manage vital records, and coordinate with federal agencies on identity documents and benefits that often hinge on citizenship status. A Supreme Court decision narrowing birthright citizenship would require adjustments in how hospitals, registrars, and state agencies handle documentation for infants born to parents with varying immigration statuses. The attorneys general suggest that a domicile-based rule would give clearer guidance to those systems than the current near-automatic approach.
Supporters of the coalition’s effort rely on originalist readings of the Constitution and on the notion that citizenship is a political membership that presumes a recognized legal tie to the nation. They contrast that with what they describe as an overgeneralized “mere-presence” rule, which they say allows geography alone to dictate citizenship. The brief frames parental domicile and lawful residency as the constitutionally relevant measures of connection, calling on the justices to draw a sharper line that harmonizes with existing exceptions like those for diplomats and enemy forces.
The case now heads into a phase where the Court will consider the arguments, the historical record cited by the attorneys general, and the relationship between the Fourteenth Amendment and modern immigration realities. The coalition urges a ruling that would instruct lower courts and administrative agencies to apply a narrower interpretation going forward. By centering their argument in the original public meaning of the Amendment, they ask the Court to provide a constitutional answer to a question that affects births in every state, including Tennessee.
With the amicus brief on file, Skrmetti and his counterparts have positioned their states at the forefront of a constitutional test with national reach. They point to the existence of long-standing exceptions and to the historical understanding of jurisdiction as reasons to limit automatic citizenship to cases where parents have lawful ties to the country.
“Conferring United States citizenship requires a more meaningful connection than mere presence by happenstance or illegality. That connection, originalist evidence repeatedly instructs, was parental domicile,” the brief states, underscoring the coalition’s core claim.
As the Court weighs whether to revisit more than a century of practice rooted in Wong Kim Ark, the attorneys general are asking for an answer that would reset how the United States defines citizenship at the very beginning of life. Their closing pitch is not to discard birthright citizenship but to redefine its edge, shifting the focus from location alone to the lawful status and domicile of parents. For Tennessee and the other 23 states in the coalition, the outcome will determine whether the Fourteenth Amendment continues to be read as guaranteeing citizenship to nearly all born on U.S. soil, or whether a new, narrower rule will govern future births.
This Article in a Nutshell
Tennessee AG Jonathan Skrmetti joined 23 state attorneys general in an October 2025 amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to narrow the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause. The coalition argues lower courts have expanded birthright citizenship through a “mere-presence” rule and asks the Court to require a meaningful parental connection—lawful status or domicile—before granting automatic citizenship. Citing United States v. Wong Kim Ark, the brief seeks explicit clarification excluding children born to parents unlawfully present. A ruling could reshape birth documentation, immigration policy, and administration of citizenship across states.
