Donald Trump knows that in politics, sometimes you can win by losing.
After making immigration reform a focus of his campaign, Trump, in an interview on NBC’s "Meet the Press,” promised to end birthright citizenship, calling the concept "ridiculous.” Perhaps the president-elect disfavors citizenship for people born in the U.S. as a matter of policy, but eliminating a legal right guaranteed by the Constitution is a tall order. Even so, it may be that Trump believes that an aggressive stance on immigration is what matters most.
The main obstacle Trump faces is the language of the Constitution. Section 1 of the 14th Amendment states: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
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