America's top judicial body has decided to consider legal challenge disputing citizenship by birth.
The US Supreme Court has agreed to take on a pivotal case that puts to the test a historic principle: guaranteed citizenship for people born within US borders.
On the inaugural day in office this January, the administration signed an order aiming to halt the policy, but the order was halted by the judiciary after legal challenges were filed.
The Supreme Court's eventual judgment will either uphold citizenship rights for the children of foreign nationals who are in the US without authorization or on short-term permits, or it will nullify those rights completely.
Next, the justices will set a time to hear oral arguments between the government and the suing parties, which comprise immigrant parents and their young children.
The 14th Amendment
For over a century and a half, the Fourteenth Amendment has codified the principle that all individuals born in the United States is a US citizen, with specific conditions for children born to embassy personnel and personnel of foreign military forces.
"Anyone born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."
The disputed presidential order sought to deny citizenship to the children of people who are either in the US illegally or are in the country on short-term status.
The United States belongs to a group of about 30 countries – largely in the Americas – that grant immediate citizenship to any person born within their borders.
