The Supreme Court Takes On Birthright Citizenship

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**Cecilia Wong** (0:22)
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**SPEAKER_4** (0:33)
Can I ask you a couple questions?

**Cecilia Wong** (0:35)
Did you sleep here last night?

**SPEAKER_3** (0:37)
Yes, we did.

**Cecilia Wong** (0:38)
We did.

**SPEAKER_3** (0:39)
We got here at about 11:30 p.m. And got some sleep until maybe 6 a.m. Yeah.

**SPEAKER_5** (0:45)
How early did you get here?

**SPEAKER_6** (0:46)
6.30.

**SPEAKER_7** (0:47)
I got here a little bit after four. So we are waiting in the line from last Sunday.

**SPEAKER_6** (0:56)
Sorry, you've been waiting in line since last Sunday?

**Sandra E. Garcia** (0:59)
Yeah. Yeah, last Sunday.

**Michael Barbaro** (1:01)
From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. On Wednesday morning in Washington, the scene outside of the Supreme Court captured the enormous stakes of the case that was about to be argued before its nine justices.

**SPEAKER_6** (1:19)
This is pivotal. This will define the immigration experience for decades.

**SPEAKER_3** (1:26)
Birthright citizenship has just been a big part of what it means to be American for a very long time, like almost as long as the country.

**SPEAKER_10** (1:34)
The crux of this is illegals or those who are temporarily shouldn't receive the benefit of American citizenship, which is to be cherished.

**Michael Barbaro** (1:43)
A case about President Trump's efforts to end birthright citizenship that literally asks who gets to be an American.

**SPEAKER_4** (1:53)
So this case was very important for me because I'm an immigrant, too. We all came for the reason because the US is a shining city on the hill. And now to change the whole thing, I'm like, did I make a right decision of wanting to come here?

**Michael Barbaro** (2:09)
And a case so historic that President Trump himself showed up in the courtroom to hear the arguments.
Today, my colleague, Ann Marimow, takes us inside the room. It's Thursday, April 2nd. And you had a pretty coveted seat inside the Supreme Court on Wednesday morning. And I suspect your eyes quickly fixed themselves on the presence of President Trump.

**Ann E. Marimow** (2:47)
Yes, it was a historic day. The first sitting president to be in the Supreme Court courtroom for an oral argument and to be sitting there as the justices were debating birthright citizenship.

**Michael Barbaro** (3:00)
And what did it look like for him to enter that august room?

**Ann E. Marimow** (3:04)
So a hush came over the courtroom as the president was escorted to his seat. The courtroom is always quiet, but this was even more quiet than usual as he walked in at that moment wearing a red tie and a dark suit and took his seat. And it's really interesting where he was seated. Instead of being close to the justices in the special seats reserved for their families and visiting dignitaries, he was seated in the front row for the public.

**Michael Barbaro** (3:32)
Why?

**Ann E. Marimow** (3:32)
I think it's because he is one of the parties in the cases and he's not a lawyer or member of the Supreme Court bar, so there he was in the front row of the public gallery.

**Michael Barbaro** (3:41)
Just far enough away perhaps for some of the justices liking. It feels difficult to overstate the symbolic potency of the head of the executive branch being in this room, in the heart of the judicial branch, and as you know well, this is a president known for very keenly understanding power and how you flex it. And it felt to me anyway like the president by showing up for these oral arguments on this case was basically saying, you all want to sit in judgment of my executive order on birthright citizenship and therefore I'm going to sit in judgment of you as you do that.

**Ann E. Marimow** (4:20)
There's absolutely a lot of symbolism having him there. He had mused about showing up previously when the court took up his tariffs plan. That was also very important to the president. He ended up not coming and saying he didn't want to be a distraction, but you're right. There's been this effort, as you've seen, when the court has ruled against him, the president has tried to intimidate the justices and criticize them in really harsh personal terms. So to have him actually there in person, face to face with the justices sent a real signal.