Conservative National Review columnist Andy McCarthy, a former Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, responded to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling (6-3) against President Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order.
McCarthy praised one of the two conservative justices who voted against the EO when he wrote: “Amy Coney Barrett is a great justice – faithfully originalist and independent minded. When a future Dem president inevitably exploits today’s lawlessness, she’ll be remembered as the one who got immunity right. If you’re of good faith, birthright citizenship is a tough issue.”
Amy Coney Barrett is a great justice – faithfully originalist and independent minded. When a future Dem president inevitably exploits today’s lawlessness, she’ll be remembered as the one who got immunity right. If you’re of good faith, birthright citizenship is a tough issue.
— Andy McCarthy (@AndrewCMcCarthy) July 1, 2026
[NOTE: Chief Justice John Roberts was the other conservative who voted with the three Democratic Justices — Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson.]
Trump’s White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy and Homeland Security Advisor Stephen Miller complained about the SCOTUS decision and wrote on social media: “One of the most destructive and outrageous decisions in the long history of the Supreme Court. American citizenship is not the birthright of the world. It belongs only and solely to Americans. No provision of the Constitution can be read to require our national self-obliteration.”
Not a single justice embraced the position that babies born to illegal aliens are categorically excluded from birthright citizenship.
Link in reply. https://t.co/FaqzdsfgbQ— Ed Whelan (@EdWhelanEPPC) June 30, 2026
McCarthy’s fellow National Review columnist, Ed Whelan, who clerked for the late Justice Antonin Scalia and served as a deputy assistant attorney general during the George W. Bush administration, replied to Miller: “Not a single justice embraced the position that babies born to illegal aliens are categorically excluded from birthright citizenship.”
[NOTE: National Review senior editor Charles Cooke responded to negative feedback about Justice Barrett: “What’s fun about Barrett Derangement Syndrome is that last week she was told how awful she is for her position in the TPS case *despite* having a Haitian child and now she’s told how awful she is in the birthright case *because* she has a Haitian child.”]
What’s fun about Barrett Derangement Syndrome is that last week she was told how awful she is for her position in the TPS case *despite* having a Haitian child and now she’s told how awful she is in the birthright case *because* she has a Haitian child. https://t.co/OHP70FrjRc
— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) June 30, 2026