Lost Canadians bill could create 115,000 more citizens, says parliamentary budget officer

2024/12/20 Leave a comment

Hard to know whether my and other critiques over the lack of numbers by the government resulted in PBO doing the needed analysis. Overall population approach versus my mix of the same Statistics Canada study and passport-based approach but responds to the need for estimated numbers. About three times higher than my upper estimate.

The one assumption that may be questionable is to assume that the current average cost of citizenship proofs would apply to all. If there had been a time limit of five years to meet the residency requirement, that would be reasonable. Without the time limit, the share of more complex residency over multiple years and longer periods, would increase the complexity and cost. The PBO itself notes that “the take-up rate may be impacted by different factors which will affect the cost of the billI,” one of which would be the time period under which residency occurred.

It would have been helpful had the PBO provided a breakdown of the 115,000 by separate groups rather than just the overall number (c and d together would form the largest group) as well as more clarity on assumption based numbers (e.g., population growth rate):

  • “a) the number of Canadians by descent born outside of Canada between February 15, 1977 and April 17, 1981 and who have derived their citizenship from a Canadian by descent parent and did not apply to retain their citizenship before the age of 28;
  • b) the children of these persons;
  • c) the children of Canadians by descent who were born after the coming into force of the first-generation limit on citizenship on April 17, 2009; and
  • d) the number of adoptees of Canadians by descent.”

Given the highly uncertain status of the current Parliament following the Freeland letter, questionable whether C-71 will progress but the PBO analysis provides a more informed basis for discussion:

A bill to reinstate rights for what are known as lost Canadians could create around 115,000 new citizens in the next five years, according to a report by the Parliamentary Budget Officer.

The report, published on Thursday, also estimates that it will cost the government $20.8-million over five years to implement the change, with $16.8-million coming in 2025-2026. The PBO presumes the law will come into force in April.

Bill C-71 was introduced by the government earlier this year after an Ontario court ruled it is unconstitutional to deny citizenship to children born overseas to Canadians also born outside the country.

The bill reverses a change by Stephen Harper’s Conservative government in 2009 that stripped children of a Canadian parent born outside Canada of their automatic right to citizenship.

The 2009 change was designed to crack down on what Conservatives called “Canadians of convenience.” It followed an outcry after Canada spent more than $80-million to evacuate 15,000 Canadian citizens from Lebanon in 2006 during the Israel-Hezbollah war.

It has led to Canadians working abroad being denied the right to pass on their citizenship to their children. It has also meant that some “border babies” – born a few kilometres away in the United States – and Indigenous children born in communities straddling the border do not qualify for Canadian passports, despite living here.

The government, which has reduced its targets for the number of permanent residents to reduce pressure on housing and other services, has never publicly said how many new Canadians it expects the change in the law will create.

The Parliamentary Budget Officer based its 115,000 figure on estimates of the number of Canadians by descent living outside Canada and assumed that their numbers grow at the same rate as the Canadian population. The PBO included people who were adopted by a Canadian who could become citizens under the change.

“The Parliamentary Budget Officer estimates a total net cost of the proposed amendments to the Citizenship Act to be $20.8-million over five years, beginning in 2025‑2026. The total number of persons that would be affected is estimated to be around 115,000 over the same period,” the report said.

Don Chapman, who has been campaigning for decades to restore rights to lost Canadians, said he did not think that all those gaining the right to citizenship under the bill who live abroad would opt to come to Canada. He said a lot of lost Canadians were already living in Canada, including children.

“It’s likely that most people who are eligible will not apply,” he said.

Source: Lost Canadians bill could create 115,000 more citizens, says parliamentary budget officer

PBO Report: Amending the Citizenship Act (2024) 

    Filed under C-71, Citizenship Tagged with , ,

    Ukrainian Parliament passes multiple #citizenship bill in first reading

    2024/12/19 Leave a comment

    Of note:

    The Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s parliament, has passed the first reading of a bill allowing multiple citizenship, with 247 lawmakers voting in favor of the legislation on 17 December 2024, according to Ukrainian MP Yaroslav Zhelezniak.

    The bill, initially submitted by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in August, aims to establish a framework for multiple citizenship in Ukraine while setting clear restrictions on who can qualify.

    According to MP Yaroslav Zhelezniak, the bill will undergo further revisions before its second reading, incorporating suggestions from organizations including the Ukrainian World Congress. In a separate vote, 150 MPs supported requesting a Constitutional Court opinion on the legislation.

    The proposed law would allow multiple citizenship in several specific cases:

    • Children acquiring dual citizenship at birth
    • Ukrainian children gaining second citizenship through foreign adoption
    • Automatic acquisition of second citizenship through marriage to a foreign citizen
    • Automatic acquisition of foreign citizenship by an adult Ukrainian citizen due to the application of another country’s citizenship laws
    • Simplified acquisition of Ukrainian citizenship for foreigners who are citizens of countries included in the list of those eligible for simplified citizenship procedures
    • Ukrainians acquiring citizenship of countries that offer simplified procedures to Ukrainian citizens

    Importantly, the law explicitly prohibits multiple citizenship for Russian citizens or citizens of any country that does not recognize Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty.

    The legislation aims to facilitate the return of Ukrainians who left the country due to the war while allowing them to maintain any additional citizenships they may have acquired. It also seeks to expand opportunities for certain categories of foreigners and stateless persons to obtain Ukrainian citizenship.

    Source: Ukrainian Parliament passes multiple citizenship bill in first reading

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    Rousso: One crucial missing criterion in Canada’s immigration policy, Russ: Canada’s failing multiculturalism needs a rethink 

    2024/12/18 Leave a comment

    The emergence of more articles arguing for some form of values test for immigrants, despite all the issues and problems in developing, implementing and enforcing the same. Starting with Rousso:

    …Canada can learn from these experiences. A comprehensive immigration policy must go beyond economic and humanitarian considerations to include an evaluation of prospective immigrants’ willingness to embrace Canadian values. While this may seem controversial or invasive, it is a fundamental right and responsibility of any nation to preserve its cultural and social framework. By addressing this gap, Canada would not only protect its democratic principles but also foster more cohesive communities.

    Practical steps could include requiring immigrants to declare their stance on key social values during the application process. This might involve affirming support for gender equality, freedom of speech, and the rule of law. Additionally, Canada could implement mandatory orientation programs for newcomers, emphasizing the country’s core principles and expectations. Such measures would not only aid integration but also reassure Canadians that their government is taking proactive steps to safeguard the nation’s identity.

    Critics may argue that introducing value-based criteria risks alienating or excluding deserving applicants. However, this is not about rejecting those in need; rather, it is about ensuring that immigrants are prepared to contribute positively to Canadian society. A values-based approach would also provide an opportunity for honest dialogue, helping to identify areas where newcomers may need support in adapting to their new environment.

    Canada’s history as a welcoming and diverse nation is one of its greatest strengths. To preserve this legacy, the government must address the blind spot in its immigration policy. The long-term social harmony and security of the nation depend on it. As immigration continues to shape Canada’s future, integrating a values-based criterion is not only reasonable but essential for the country to thrive in an increasingly divided world.

    Dotan Rousso was born and raised in Israel and holds a Ph.D. in Law. He is a former criminal prosecutor in Israel. He currently lives in Alberta and teaches Philosophy at the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (SAIT).

    Source: OP-ED: One crucial missing criterion in Canada’s immigration policy

    From Russ:

    …Citizenship is a covenant that mandates living with goodwill and in peace among your neighbours. In no way does it entitle you to attack places of worship or threaten your fellow citizens in the streets because it’s what your grandfather might have done at another time in another land. Attacking a Hindu temple or synagogue, whether the perpetrators were born here or abroad, is unacceptable in Canada, as is using the country as a base to try to launch terrorist attacks in the United States.

    To this day, the vast majority of people who immigrate to Canada are peaceful, and it is wrong to tar entire groups with the same brushstrokes. Also true is that throughout history, there are the violent, radical few who terrify and bully the many.

    On Remembrance Day, thousands of Canadians gathered at the cenotaphs to commemorate over 100,000 of our soldiers who died in Canada’s wars, chief among them the struggle that stopped Adolf Hitler during the Second World War. They did not die so that feral antisemites could raise Nazi salutes in Montreal and call for a “final solution.”

    Those who did remember on Nov. 11 exemplify the vast, ignored backbone of Canada. Their ancestors came from around the world, and they dutifully go to work, obey the law, and raise families in a country where all can recognize each other as Canadian, or aspire to do so.

    Some of our leaders, who espouse multiculturalism as the only pillar of Canadian society, have failed to distinguish between welcoming new people and allowing radicals to remake its culture and politics entirely. Canada may be a constitutionally multicultural country, but that comes with no ironclad policy directives.

    Multiculturalism need be no more than a bargain that nobody should be asked to abandon their ancestral language, religion, or holiday, but that your vendettas should be forgotten and that you will abide by the customs and values of Canada. There are ways to enforce this essential distinction.

    It was suggested in The Hub that a Canadian values test for new immigrants is sorely needed right now, and it is. One question that belongs on that test is, “Is it acceptable to attack a community’s house of worship?” They could answer “no” and lie, it’s true, but if the answer is affirmative, then they ought to be shown the door with no further questions.

    Those already here who violate the multicultural covenant should be sternly punished, not coddled by politicians like Mélanie Joly, who subordinates Canadian foreign policy to the “demographics” of her riding. If some feel that they can raise a Nazi salute in Canada, it is time to accept that simply holding the passport does not mean somebody embodies Canadian values.

    In 2017, sections of Bill C-24, which allowed for the revocation of citizenship for people convicted of terrorism-related offences, were repealed. Reintroducing and passing those measures would send a strong message now in 2024.

    Many wounds have been inflicted upon Canada over the past few years, and these are but a few ways of healing them.

    However, Canadians are right to expect their government to set an example by having the bravery and stomach to lead the healing of these wounds, which will involve making an example of the rot festering within them.

    If those in power right now will not do this, then Canada needs new leadership.

    Source: Geoff Russ: Canada’s failing multiculturalism needs a rethink

    Filed under Citizenship, Immigration Tagged with , ,

    The GOP stoked fears of noncitizens voting. Cases in Ohio show how rhetoric and reality diverge

    2024/12/17 Leave a comment

    No surprise:

    Before the November presidential election, Ohio’s secretary of state and attorney general announced investigations into potential voter fraud that included people suspected of casting ballots even though they were not U.S. citizens.

    It coincided with a national Republican messaging strategy warning that potentially thousands of ineligible voters would be voting.

    “The right to vote is sacred,” Attorney General Dave Yost, a Republican, said in a statement at the time. “If you’re not a U.S. citizen, it’s illegal to vote -– whether you thought you were allowed to or not. You will be held accountable.”

    In the end, their efforts led to just a handful of cases. Of the 621 criminal referrals for voter fraud that Secretary of State Frank LaRose sent to the attorney general, prosecutors have secured indictments against nine people for voting as noncitizens over the span of 10 years — and one was later found to have died. That total is a tiny fraction of Ohio’s 8 million registered voters and the tens of millions of ballots cast during that period.

    The outcome and the stories of some of those now facing charges illustrate the gap — both in Ohio and across the United States — between the rhetoric about noncitizen voting and the reality: It’s rare, is caught and prosecuted when it does happen and does not occur as part of a coordinated scheme to throw elections.

    Source: The GOP stoked fears of noncitizens voting. Cases in Ohio show how rhetoric and reality diverge

    Filed under Citizenship Tagged with , ,

    C-71 Senate SOCI Report

    2024/12/16 Leave a comment

    Of note, as often happens, the narrower interests related to adoption prevail over broader policy considerations (time limit for residency test):

    This bill is a response to the December 2023 decision from the Ontario Superior Court of Justice (Bjorkquist et al. v. Attorney General of Canada). This decision declared that the existing provisions in the Citizenship Act that limit citizenship by descent to the first generation born abroad, contravene the mobility and equality rights provisions in sections 6 and 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (the Charter). These provisions in the Act are thus unconstitutional and, as such, have no force or effect. The Court suspended its declaration of invalidity until December 19, 2024, to give the Government of Canada time to amend the Citizenship Act.

    With consideration to the impending court deadline, on November 28, 2024, the subject matter of Bill C-71 was referred to your committee for a pre-study, with instructions to report its findings to the Senate within two weeks. Your committee therefore received limited witness testimony and did not have enough time to seek additional clarity from stakeholders and government officials on this important piece of legislation. Your committee examined the subject matter of this bill over two meetings, hearing testimony from the Honourable Marc Miller, P.C., M.P., Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship and departmental officials, in addition to six stakeholders.

    Your committee heard broad support for the substantial connection test proposed by Bill C-71.

    Concerns around equity and consideration of rights guaranteed by the Charter dominated much of the other limited testimony that was received. The Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship stated that, if Bill C-71 is adopted, the Citizenship Act will be in full compliance with the Charter for the first time in its history. While some stakeholders agreed that the bill addresses the exclusions of the current Act, others cautioned that inequities in recognizing citizenship may persist, including violations of Charter rights.

    In particular, concerns were raised by some stakeholders about the requirements for recognizing the citizenship of the children of internationally born adoptees. Your committee heard diverging perspectives on this point and, therefore, encourages the Government of Canada to engage with relevant stakeholders to further investigate this issue and consider amendments to the bill, if required.

    Your committee also acknowledges the overall complexity of the Citizenship Act and suggests that careful consideration be taken at each step of the legislative and implementation processes relevant to this bill to prevent future lost Canadians and further violation of Charter rights.

    During his testimony, the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship informed the committee that the Government of Canada is seeking an additional extension to the court deadline.

    Source: C-71 Senate SOCI Report

    Media coverage focused on extension of court deadline:

    An unknown number of people will automatically become Canadian citizens next week if the Ontario Superior Court doesn’t grant the federal government a third extension to fix the issue of “lost Canadians,” Canada argued in court Thursday.

    “Lost Canadians” is a term applied to people who were born outside of the country to Canadian parents who were also born in another country. In 2009, the former Conservative government changed the law so people who were born abroad could not pass down their citizenship unless their child was born in Canada.

    In late 2023, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruled that law is unconstitutional.The government has until Dec. 19 to amend the Citizenship Act to respond to that decision. It is now seeking its third extension, after being granted delays in June and August.

    In court Thursday the government asked for the Dec. 19 deadline to be delayed three months, until March 19, 2025, to give them more time to pass legislation.

    The Liberals introduced the amendments to the Citizenship Act in May but the bill only began real debate in September. It has been sidelined since then, as an ongoing battle between the Conservatives and Liberals delays most work in the House of Commons.

    The new legislation stipulates that anyone who meets the criteria would be eligible for citizenship if their parents spent a cumulative three years in Canada before they were born.

    Source: Missed ’Lost Canadians’ deadline would make ’unknowable’ number of new citizens: feds

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    Pro-life groups need to defend birthright citizenship

    2024/12/14 Leave a comment

    Interesting take (but then again, Catholic organizations tend to support more generous immigration and related policies, unlike Evangelicals):

    President-elect Donald Trump stated he plans to end birthright citizenship, which is currently guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. The pro-life movement, which is as significant a part of the GOP base as the anti-immigrant caucus, needs to step up and oppose any attempt to end the conferral of citizenship on those born in the United States.

    The foundational argument of the pro-life movement is that all life is sacred, and that once you start parsing who is, and who is not, entitled to certain rights, you are halfway down a slippery moral slope. All human beings, as human beings, should enjoy the same rights as every other human being.

    The relationship of abortion policy to immigration policy might seem counterintuitive. The 14th Amendment doesn’t help the pro-life cause. It refers to “All persons born or naturalized in the United States …” Pro-choice groups argue that a human being only has a right to life once it is born, but once born, the rights that are conferred on the person are sacrosanct.

    Those who drafted and enacted the 14th Amendment were not addressing the moral and legal issues surrounding abortion, and they didn’t have sonograms in 1866 when members of Congress began drafting the amendment after President Andrew Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Act that year.

    The drafters of the 14th Amendment aimed to extend the equal protection of the laws to those formerly enslaved. They knew that the framers of the original Constitution had it wrong when they decreed that slaves only counted as three-fifths of a person for purposes of representation in the Congress. They knew that the founders had been wrong about slavery entirely. They knew that this diminishment of the humanity of those who had been enslaved was an affront to our nation’s foundational claims about human freedom and legal equality.

    The pro-life movement has always been constructed on this deeper moral concern, that no person should have their humanity diminished, even if the movement has failed to live up to this high ideal. The source of human rights is our civilizational belief in transcendent human dignity. Virtually every religion expresses this belief in some way. Ours expresses it in terms of the imago Dei, the belief that every person is made in the image of likeness of God. Every time the pro-life movement ignores other threats to this God-given human dignity, it weakens its credibility.

    “Catholic social thought starts with the dignity of each person and the whole person,” Dylan Corbett, executive director of the Hope Border Institute which advocates for immigrants, told me. “This is the bedrock of the church’s commitment to the poor, the unborn and the vulnerable, without distinction. In the coming months, the Trump administration’s targeting of our parishioners, neighbors and the essential workers in our communities simply because of immigration status will test the credibility of our moral witness.”

    Kristen Day, director of Democrats for Life of America agrees. “Pro-life principles don’t end where Donald Trump’s pet projects begin,” she told me via email. “Remaining silent on the issue of birthright citizenship would betray our movement’s highest values because there is nothing pro-life about ending it. Life begins at conception, but it doesn’t end at birth.”

    To be clear, even a democracy seriously engaged in working for equality will need to draw distinctions, to discriminate, between people. We all know a precocious 16- or 17-year-old who is more mature than some 20-somethings we know, but unless you are 18, you don’t get to vote. We wouldn’t want the government devising some kind of test that decides who is worthy to vote, and who isn’t, and so we set an arbitrary cutoff. That arbitrary cutoff is applied universally.

    In terms of abortion policy, conception, viability and birth are the usual cutoffs, and there is an argument to be made for any of the three. Only the first coheres with Catholic teaching, and in most pluralistic democracies, the cutoff is at some point between conception and viability.

    As a culture, a society and a polity, we need to learn how to think more deeply, and less arbitrarily, about where we draw such lines.

    The idea that a person is a citizen of the place where he or she is born is a bulwark against any attempt to discriminate unjustly. A good way to sniff if a particular discrimination is just or unjust is to ask whether it is universal. Birthright citizenship is universal: It applies to everyone born here.

    This political linkage of immigration and abortion cuts both ways. Pro-immigrant arguments would have greater moral cogency to many Americans if they were put forward by people who are committed to protecting the lives of unborn children, or at least not indifferent to the dignity of those unborn children. Given the polarization of the country, that moral linkage is not apparent to most and will be dismissed by many. Still, moral coherence eventually wins out most of the time.

    At this moment in our nation’s political history, the pro-life movement should rally around the cause of defending birthright citizenship.

    Source: Pro-life groups need to defend birthright citizenship

    Filed under Birthright Citizenship, Citizenship, Trump administration Tagged with , , ,

    Canadian Immigration Tracker – October 2024 Update

    2024/12/14 Leave a comment

    Year to date highlights:

    • Permanent residents admissions: Increase January-October from 404,000 in 2023 to 413,000 in 2024 or 2.3 percent.   
    • TR2PR (Those already in Canada): Increase January-October from 212,000 in 2023 to 219,000 in 2024 or 3.3 percent. 
    • TRs-IMP: Decrease January-October from 757,000 in 2023 to 648,000 in 2024 or -14.5 percent.
    • TRs-TFWP: Decrease January-October from 172,000 in 2023 to 165,000 in 2024 or -4.0 percent.
    • Students: Decrease January-October from 570,000 in 2023 to 461,000 in 2024 or -19.2 percent. Post-secondary only: Decline from 431,000 to 328,000 or 23.9 percent.
    • Asylum Claimants: Increase January-October from 117,000 in 2023 to 149,000 in 2024 or 27.3 percent.
    • Citizenship: Increase January-October from 317,000 in 2023 to 329,000 in 2024 or 3.7 percent.
    • Visitor Visas: Decrease January-October from 1,567,000 in 2023 to 1,290,000 in 2024 or -17.7 percent.

    https://www.slideshare.net/slideshow/canadian-immigration-tracker-october-2024-pdf/274022459

    Filed under Citizenship, Immigration Tagged with , ,

    Experts pour cold water on Trump’s plan to end birthright citizenship — but issue a stark warning

    2024/12/12 Leave a comment

    Think this assessment largely correct. More performative but not without consequences and distracts from what the administration can and will do:

    …”President-elect Trump is trying to send a message to people all over the world and also to unauthorized immigrants in the United States that he’s going to be tough on immigration,” argued Julia Gelatt, the associate director of the U.S. Immigration Policy Program at the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), a nonpartisan think tank.

    “He hopes that people will choose not to make the trip to the United States and not try to enter,” she told Salon in a phone interview. “I think he also hopes that people who are living in the United States without status might opt to leave the country on their own.”

    Trump has signaled an interest in repealing birthright citizenship since his first run for president, including the change in his immigration policy proposal in 2015, according to CNN. Trump insisted to Axios in 2018 that it was possible to do so through an executive order and last May, Trump released a campaign video proclaiming he would sign an executive order to roll back the right on day one of his presidency, according to NBC News.

    The impact of repealing the right would be immense. A 2020 MPI and Pennsylvania State University analysis found that ending birthright citizenship for U.S. babies with two undocumented immigrant parents would lead to a 4.7 million-person increase in the population of unauthorized people by 2050, including one million children born to two parents who had been born in the U.S. themselves.

    That population would skyrocket to 24 million by 2050 from 11 million at the time of the analysis’ publishing if U.S. babies with only one undocumented parent were also denied citizenship, the researchers found.

    Gelatt said that such an action from the Trump administration would create a “multigenerational class of people who are excluded from full rights” and citizenship, which would restrain their ability to achieve higher earnings, support their families and contribute to the country through taxes.

    “Denying people that legal status, even if they’re born in the United States, would put people in a much more legally vulnerable, economically vulnerable position,” she said.

    Depending on the exact language of Trump’s proposed executive order, ending birthright citizenship could also impact U.S.-born children’s parents, added Stephen Yale-Loehr, a professor of immigration law practice at Cornell Law School. Such an order could potentially prevent officials from issuing passports, Social Security numbers or providing welfare benefits to family members of those children.

    But Trump has no viable legal pathway to repealing birthright citizenship, Yale-Loehr told Salon in an email. An executive order can’t repeal an amendment, and any executive action Trump took attempting to do so would “trigger immediate litigation.”

    Birthright citizenship was enshrined in the U.S. Constitution in 1868 with the ratification of the 14th Amendment, which was intended to grant citizenship and civil liberties to formerly enslaved African Americans. Contrary to what Trump told Welker, more than 30 nations, largely in the western hemisphere, provide birthright citizenship.

    Amending the Constitution to upend the 14th Amendment would require a two-thirds vote in both the House and the Senate as well as ratification by three-fourths of the state legislatures. Even with slim Republican majorities in both chambers during Trump’s next term, such a proposal would be unlikely to get past either chamber.

    His proposed executive order is also unlikely to withstand any legal challenges as the likelihood of the Supreme Court, despite its conservative majority, striking birthright citizenship from the Constitution is slim to none, added Hiroshi Motomura, a UCLA School of Law professor and faculty co-director of the Center for Immigration Law and policy.

    “Even though people say that the court has become more conservative, this would be even further in the direction of trying to overturn the past than we’ve seen,” he told Salon in a phone interview.

    Ending birthright citizenship would upend the foundation of how the nation has historically seen itself — as a country of immigrants — flying in the face of the purpose of the American Civil War and much of the United States immigration history since its founding, Motomura said. He pointed to the 1898 U.S. v. Wong Kim ArkSupreme Court decision that held that U.S.-born children of Chinese immigrants were U.S. citizens under the 14th Amendment even though their parents were, at the time, legally barred from obtaining citizenship under the Chinese Exclusion Acts.

    “This is all part of the racial history of the United States. This is why this is so bedrock compared to other things that the Supreme Court is sometimes characterized for doing as being quite radical,” he explained. “This goes way beyond overruling Roe v. Wade. I think that was a radical move, but this is no comparison. This is quite a bit more of a rethinking of what the country is even about.”

    Given how unlikely it is that Trump would succeed at repealing birthright citizenship, what purpose, then, could Trump’s focus on ending the right serve? Generating political value, Gelatt and Motomura argued, the former pointing to the importance of illegal immigration and the border to voters during the 2024 election.

    Source: Experts pour cold water on Trump’s plan to end birthright citizenship — but issue a stark warning

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    Trump Prepares for Legal Fight Over His ‘Birthright Citizenship’ Curbs

    2024/12/10 Leave a comment

    Unlikely to succeed is the general consensus but we are seeing signs of those interested in becoming a member of the Supreme Court changing their position:

    President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team is drafting several versions of his long-promised executive order to curtail automatic citizenship for anyone born in the U.S., according to people familiar with the matter, as his aides prepare for an expanded legal fight.

    Trump, who has railed against so-called birthright citizenship for years, said during his first term that he was planning an executive order that would outright ban it. Such an order was never signed, but the issue remained a focus of Trump’s immigration proposals during his re-election campaign. He has said he would tackle the issue in an executive order on day one of his second term.

    Weeks before he takes office, Trump’s transition team is now considering how far to push the scope of such an order, knowing it would almost immediately be challenged in court, according to a transition official and others familiar with the matter. The eventual order is expected to focus on changing the requirements for documents issued by federal agencies that verify citizenship, such as a passport.

    Through an executive order or the agency rule-making process, Trump is also expected to take steps to deter what Trump allies call “birth tourism,” in which pregnant women travel to the U.S. to have children, who receive the benefit of citizenship. One option on the table is to tighten the criteria to qualify for a tourist visa, according to people familiar with the Trump team’s thinking. Tourist visas are most often issued for a period of 10 years, though the tourist can’t stay in the U.S. on each visit for longer than six months.

    Karoline Leavitt, a spokeswoman for the Trump transition, said the president-elect “will use every lever of power to deliver on his promises, and fix our broken immigration system once and for all.”

    Some on the right have backed Trump’s plans and argued that birthright citizenship is a misinterpretation of the 14th amendment, which dates back to the 19th century and in part granted full citizenship to former slaves. They have also criticized birth tourism. Companies in China have attracted attention in recent years for advertising such services, and airlines in Asia even started turning away some pregnant passengers they suspected of traveling to give birth.

    “Because you happen to be in this country when your child is born, is not a reason for that child to be a U.S. citizen. It’s just silly, and the reliance on it in law is utterly misplaced,” said Ken Cuccinelli, a senior fellow at the Center for Renewing America, a pro-Trump think tank, who previously served as deputy secretary of Homeland Security.

    Many constitutional scholars and civil-rights groups have said a change to birthright citizenship can’t be done through executive action and would require amending the Constitution—a rare and difficult process. The most recent amendment was ratified in 1992, more than 200 years after it was first proposed.

    T rump on the campaign trail this year offered more details on what executive action related to birthright citizenship could include compared with his first term, a change that some backers took as an indication that he is more willing to act on the issue.

    Trump said he would sign a “day one” executive order directing federal agencies to require a child to have at least one parent be either a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident to automatically become a U.S. citizen. It would also stop agencies from issuing passports, Social Security numbers and other welfare benefits to children who don’t meet the new requirement for citizenship, the president-elect’s campaign had said.

    “My policy will choke off a major incentive for continued illegal immigration, deter more migrants from coming, and encourage many of the aliens Joe Biden has unlawfully let into our country to go back to their home countries,” Trump said in a campaign video.

    But the requirement that at least one parent be a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident would also affect children born to parents who immigrated legally through visas, excluding them from automatic citizenship. 

    “The new piece of it is them talking publicly about the mechanism they might try to use to operationalize this unconstitutional plan,” said Omar Jadwat, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Immigrants’ Rights Project. “They just can’t do that consistent with the constitution.” 

    “ Litigation is definitely going to follow,” he added. 

    The Supreme Court affirmed birthright citizenship in its 1898 ruling in U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark. But critics of automatic citizenship argue Trump’s proposed citizenship restrictions would be different from that case, which involved a child born to Chinese parents who were legal permanent residents in the U.S.

    Trump’s allies say a legal fight that makes its way to the Supreme Court is the point of the executive order. 

    “Force the issue and see what happens,” said Mark Krikorian, executive director for the Center for Immigration Studies, a group favoring immigration restrictions that was close to Trump’s first administration. Even with the court’s conservative majority, Krikorian isn’t optimistic about Trump’s chances.

    “ I think they’ll probably uphold the current interpretation of the 14th Amendment,” he said. “They’re going to want to start that court fight as soon as possible to see if they can see it through to the end before the administration ends,” he said.

    Source: Trump Prepares for Legal Fight Over His ‘Birthright Citizenship’ Curbs

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    C-71 Senate committee hearings: My take

    2024/12/09 Leave a comment

    While I have followed the debates and discussions regarding “lost” Canadians over the years, this was my first time testifying on the issue in the context of C-71 along with many familiar faces. My one ongoing observation is despite all the language around up to one million “lost” Canadians, the reality is that most “lost” Canadians appear not want to be found, with only about 20,000 citizenship proofs issued (2 percent) since the first fix for those who lost their citizenship. 

    The other general comment pertains to the government’s policy choice of not having the same time limit to meet the residency requirement as for Permanent Residents. The statement by officials that this is intended to make it easier and more flexible for applicants suggests that officials, and likely the minister, have not learned many lessons from the overly facilitative approach for Permanent Residents, international students and temporary workers, all of which the government has since rolled back.

    We shall see the SOCI report in a few weeks and will see what points they took on and which ones they don’t.

    The following is my take on the major points raised during Senate’s SOCI pre-study hearings on the Bill. 

    Connection test: 1,095 days cumulative with no time limit (C-71) vs within 5 years: My earlier article and formal submission advocating for the residency requirement to be limited to the same 5 year period as per citizenship applicants provoked discussion at the Senate’s SOCI, with a number of senators questioning the rationale for the government’s decision. 

    Minister Miller argued that it was unlikely that the residency requirement would be “spread over forty years” and that a longer time period still means a “fairly important connection,” citing Lebanese Canadians as an example, the “Canadians of convenience” example that was the genesis of the first generation cutoff.  (Miller’s riding is about three percent Lebanese ethnic origin). The Minister also indicated concerns that the five-year limit would create another series of “lost Canadians.” 

    Officials further noted that the aim of C-71 was to be facilitative, citing examples of persons coming to Canada annually for summer vacations or family visits. Notably, neither the Minister nor officials addressed the operational complexities of a residency requirement with no time limit. Most witnesses and senators support a connection test.

    The appropriateness of a residency-base connection test was accepted by most witnesses.

    There was some discussion about whether the lack of a time limit increased the risk of “citizens of convenience,” with the Minister not believing it would (I had previously indicating more likely without a five-year limit).

    The possibility of using the electoral list as a basis for a connection test was raised. Given that only about 57,000 persons living outside Canada were issued ballots, only a small fraction of those living abroad, hard to see how this would be a valid alternative.

    Numbers affected and operational impact: The Minister and officials provided existing operational data but, beyond generalities, did not share any more detailed internal analysis. There are about 700 applications under the interim measures for those affected by the first generation limit. The Minister does not anticipate that “wild scenarios of hundreds and thousands” will materialize. Officials did not appear to have undertaken any analysis similar to that in my submission that provides estimated orders of magnitude. The other element of note is that the understandable focus was on the immediate cases, those born abroad and unable to transmit their citizenship. There was little to no discussion of the future operational impact and numbers when those second generation children born-abroad had children of their own also born abroad (as is the case of my grandson, who would have to meet the residency test). 

    Awareness and clarity: Predictable and legitimate calls for efforts to make those affected aware of the change, with officials indicating their efforts to make persons aware of the interim measures with work underway to prepare once Bill C-71 comes into force. The issue of readability of the current Act and the need for a new Act in lay language was raised, with the Minister noting his agreement in principle but not a priority in the final months of the government’s mandate.

    Indian status and citizenship: That some Indigenous persons have Indian status but not citizenship and vice versa was raised, with the Minister noting “ridiculous situations” and that citizenship should be automatic but there were examples of First Nations that were not Canadian.

    Adoptions: The CBA raised the issue of the difference between naturally born children, whose citizenship starts on the day of birth, in contrast to adopted children, who only obtain citizenship when the adoption is approved, recommending that the US and British approach of the effective date of adoption being the date of birth of the child. Hard for me to see any practical impact of current policy or substantive inequalities but understand importance to adoptee parents. 

    Similarly, I find it difficult to understand the arguments that internationally adopted children, citizens by grant under S 5.1 are being discriminated against compared to naturally born children. (If I recall correctly, the direct route under S 5.1 was a response to parents who wanted their adopted child to be treated identically to a natural-born child, and not under the Permanent Resident pathway as an immigrant. In my view, hard to have it both ways and there does not appear to be any substantive differential treatment in C-71). 

    The Minister himself, noting the test applies to the parents, not the child, did not see an inequality. Officials in a clear presentation clarified that natural and adopted are treated as similarly as possible and that not requiring the connection test for international adoptions could mean that citizenship could be passed on through generations without residency in Canada.

    Transcript below (preliminary): “If Bill C-71 is amended to eliminate the substantial connections test in the international context and begins to treat adopted persons as if they were naturalized citizens and not citizens by descent, as is in the case for children born abroad to Canadians, this will result in differential outcome for the two groups. Children adopted abroad by Canadians would benefit preferential treatment compared to children born abroad to Canadians, who would then be subject to different and more onerous requirements in order to pass on citizenship by descent. 

    If Bill C-71 were to eliminate the substantial connection requirement, again in an international adoptions context, it could mean that a child born abroad and adopted to a Canadian parent could then also adopt a child abroad and pass on citizenship despite never living in Canada. This would mean citizenship by descent could be passed down through generations of people who have never lived in Canada.”

    When I worked on these issues some 14 years ago, I always found a graphic was helpful on how C-71 would work with my effort below: 

    Filed under C-71, Citizenship Tagged with

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