WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump plans to sit in on Wednesday’s Supreme Court hearing on birthright citizenship, making him the first sitting president to attend oral arguments at the nation’s highest court.
The Republican president’s official schedule, sent out by the White House, included a stop at the Supreme Court, where justices will hear Trump’s appeal of a lower court ruling that struck down his executive order limiting birthright citizenship.
The order, which Trump signed on the first day of his second term, declared that children born to parents who are in the United States illegally or temporarily are not American citizens. It’s an about-face from the long-standing view that the Constitution’s 14th Amendment and federal law since 1940 confer citizenship to everyone born on American soil, with narrow exceptions.
It’s not the first time Trump has considered showing up for a high court hearing. Last year, Trump said that he badly wanted to attend a hearing on whether he overstepped federal law with his sweeping tariffs, but he decided against it, saying it would have been a distraction.
On Tuesday, however, Trump seemed more sure he’d be in court for Wednesday’s hearing while he spoke with reporters in the Oval Office.
“I’m going,” Trump said, when the upcoming arguments in the birthright citizenship case were mentioned. To a follow-up question clarifying that he planned to go in person, Trump said, “I think so, I do believe.”
Trump went to the Supreme Court in his first term for the ceremonial swearing-in of the first justice he appointed, Neil Gorsuch. Two other justices he appointed — Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett — also sit on the court.
Other presidents have dealt directly with the court, but don’t appear to have done so while in office. Richard Nixon argued a case between his time as vice president and president, and William Howard Taft served as chief justice after his presidency.
Trump, asked to whom he would be listening most closely, went on a lengthy detour Tuesday describing a court he viewed as mostly partisan, between justices appointed by Republican and Democratic presidents.
“I love a few of them,” he said. “I don’t like some others.”
The citizenship restrictions are a part of Trump’s broader immigration crackdown, but they have not yet taken effect anywhere in the country after being blocked by several courts.
A definitive ruling from the Supreme Court is expected by early summer.
