When the Supreme Court struck down President Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order in Trump v. Barbara, it settled for now in the courts who becomes a citizen at birth. It did not settle—and could not settle—whether American citizenship may be bought and sold.
It remains well within the power of Congress and the president to shut down the contracts, clinics, agencies, and visas that convert foreign money into American citizenship—without amending the Constitution or defying the Court. Until the Court revisits the issue, the political branches are solely responsible for overseeing the marketplace, and they have no excuse to delay.
If you doubt that such a marketplace exists, meet the Simpson triplets.
Nearly 20 months ago, Kyla Simpson of St. Augustine, Florida, gave birth to triplet boys as a gestational surrogate for an intended parent she had never met: a single man in China. He never came. Not during the boys’ two months in the NICU, not through the year and a half the Simpsons raised them, and not even when one of the triplets died of RSV.
Until the man from China sent two strangers in a black SUV to collect the boys, which Simpson refused. Then she moved to terminate his parental rights, and he resurfaced with a lawyer and an emergency pick-up order, which a Florida judge granted. The surviving twins, 20-month-old American citizens, now sit in state care while his attorneys obtain travel documents.
Why would a Chinese man pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for children he has never crossed an ocean to meet? Because he wasn’t buying children. He was buying American citizens.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member