Birthright citizenship and national security

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MYRNA BROWN, HOST: It’s Thursday the 12th of March.

You’re listening to WORLD Radio and we thank you for joining us today. Good morning, I’m Myrna Brown.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

First up on The World and Everything in It: Birth tourism and national security concerns.

Congress held a hearing this week examining birthright citizenship and immigration policy. One witness argued that a little-noticed practice known as “birth tourism” has grown into something far more organized—and potentially risky.

WORLD’s Nick Eicher reports.

NICK EICHER: For a century-plus, American law has treated citizenship as straightforward: if you are born on U.S. soil, you are a U.S. citizen.

That principle comes from the 14th Amendment, written after the Civil War to guarantee citizenship to formerly enslaved Americans.

But some lawmakers say the rule, which was designed for a different era, is now being exploited.

This week, the Senate Judiciary Committee heard testimony from investigative reporter Peter Schweizer. He told lawmakers a global industry now helps foreign nationals travel to the U.S. with one purpose in mind: to give birth to citizen children.

SCHWEIZER: Birth tourism is essentially an industry that provides concierge service at every step of the way for a foreign national, in this case, China, to pay the firm roughly $100,000. They will transport them to the United States, arrange medical care, arrange for citizenship for the child…

Schweizer says that what once happened occasionally has become something far more organized.

SCHWEIZER: The scope of this is industrial. In China alone we have identified more than 1,000 birth tourism companies that are almost exclusively focused on the United States. The Chinese government gave an estimate a few years ago, their estimate was that on average, 50,000 Chinese citizens a year were giving birth in the United States or at US territories like Saipan.

Some senators questioned how much of that can actually be quantified.

DURBIN: You’ve got some big claims, but when it comes to the numbers, you ought to be able to tell us how many have actually been prosecuted.

SCHWEIZER: The initial number of the estimate of Chinese birth tourism comes from Chinese sources. 

Schweizer acknowledged the government does not track birth tourism systematically, but he told senators that the gap in the data is part of the problem. Without formal tracking, he argued, the true scale may be impossible to measure.

And he says some of the known cases involve people closely tied to the Chinese government.

SCHWEIZER: These are not political dissidents… these are military officers… people from the Ministry of Propaganda… people that are high ranking officials in the Chinese Communist Party. In other words, these are part of the CCP establishment. 

Schweizer says the long-term implications could be significant.

SCHWEIZER: So if you do the math, you are potentially looking at anywhere from between 750,000 to 1.5 million ‘U.S. citizens’ that are being raised in China. Because these children are born here, as soon as they are capable of flying they are flown back to China and that's where they are raised. 

Birth tourism is only one pathway he described. Another involves American surrogacy arrangements.

In one case Schweizer told senators about a California property connected to a businessman with ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

SCHWEIZER: There was a CCP official in California in May of last year that was found by Califnoria child services. He had 26 children through surrogacy in the state of California. All of those children, of course, would become U.S. citizens.

Other reports suggest even larger numbers.

SCHWEIZER: The Wall Street Journal about 8 weeks ago had a front page story about a Chinese billionaire who is also close to the CCP who has more than 100 children done through surrogacy in the United States.

Schweizer says cases like these raise complicated legal questions.

China officially bans dual citizenship. But in practice, he told senators, authorities often tolerate it when it serves their interests.

SCHWEIZER: China does not officially recognize dual citizenship, but they allow de facto dual citizenship to operate.

Schweizer argues the larger concern is whether American law is being used strategically by foreign actors.

SCHWEIZER: This is a serious national security issue. We need to close loopholes and we need to recognize the magnitude of this problem.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court is preparing to weigh in on the broader question of birthright citizenship.

The justices are scheduled to hear arguments in a case in April. It'll test whether the government can restrict citizenship for children born in the U.S. to parents who are in the country illegally or only temporarily.

The outcome could reshape how the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment is interpreted.

For now, though, the current rule remains in place.

Leaving a deeper question: Whether the United States can continue offering one of the world’s most generous definitions of citizenship without turning that generosity into a strategic vulnerability.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Nick Eicher.

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