Ryan splits with Trump over birthers plan

House speaker Paul Ryan says Donald Trump can’t scrap by executive order a constitutional guarantee to citizenship.

Migrants catch a ride in Oaxaca, Mexico, yesterday. Picture: AFP

Outgoing house speaker and Republican former vice-presidential nominee Paul Ryan believes President Donald Trump does not have the power to scrap by executive order a constit­utional guarantee to citizenship for anyone born on US soil.

The surprise announcement by Mr Trump in an interview with Axios followed the dispatch of more than 5000 troops to the Mexican border, itself a highly unusu­al move prompted by his warnings of a migrant “invasion.”

The birthright citizenship proposal was likely to prove even more controversial, given questions over whether a president can meddle with the constitution at all.

The right to US citizenship for all born in the country is enshrined in the 14th amendment. To change the constitution requires a two-thirds majority in congress — something almost unthinkable in today’s deeply partisan, near evenly split legislature.

But Mr Trump told Axios that he now believes a stroke of his pen will be enough. “It was always told to me that you needed a constit­utional amendment,’’ he said. “Guess what? You don’t. Now they’re saying I can do it just with an executive order.”

Mr Trump railed against the rule, erroneously saying the US is unique in granting citizenship this way. “We’re the only country in the world where a person comes in, has a baby and the person is essenti­ally a citizen of the United States for 85 years with all of those benefits. It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous and it has to end,” he said.

While most countries around the world do not grant citizenship automatically to newborns, more than two dozen do, including Canad­a, which like its US neighbour grants citizenship to children born to illegal immigrants.

Mr Trump’s fellow Republic­ans stressed that it was impossible to change a cornerstone of the US immigration system by executive order.

“You cannot end birthright citizenship with an executive order,” said Mr Ryan, 48, who has repeatedly denied he is quitting congress to run for the White House.

“As a conservative, I’m a believe­r in following the plain text of the constitution, and I think in this case the 14th amendment is pretty clear, and that would involv­e a very, very lengthy constit­utional process.”

Republicans have, however, repeate­dly tried to question that principle. Senator Lindsey ­Graham hailed Mr Trump’s announceme­nt. “Finally, a president willing to take on this absurd policy of birthright citizenship,” he wrote on Twitter, calling birthright citizenship a “magnet for illega­l immigration” to the US.

Mr Trump supported the “birthers” in their bid to prove ­Barack Obama was born in Kenya, not the US, and thus unable to run for the White House in 2008.

The 14th amendment says: “All persons born or naturalised in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

AFP