Overview
- Mexico automatically grants citizenship to children born on its soil, and a Haitian family in Tijuana says their granddaughter’s Mexican birth has improved her mobility and future prospects.
- Mexican law allows parents of citizen children to apply for permanent residency, a pathway that has helped many Haitian families regularize their status in Tijuana.
- About three dozen countries, mostly in the Americas, use birthright citizenship; the Dominican Republic’s 2007 rollback and the later emergence of up to 130,000 stateless people show the risks of curtailing jus soli.
- The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to review President Trump’s Jan. 20, 2025 order that seeks to deny birthright citizenship to some children of noncitizen parents, a ruling that could alter legal rights and migration incentives.
- Wednesday’s coverage emphasizes the human effects of jus soli, notes Mexico does not publish figures on births to noncitizen parents, and recalls IOM data showing a 2021 surge in Haitian migrants with at least 10% of arriving women pregnant.