Gotta love the Tea Party and their standing for life, liberty, and the exclusion of people that they don't like or who don't look like them. ABCNews.com has a piece saying that Sens. David Vitter, Rand Paul, Mike Lee, and Jerry Moran are sponsoring a bill to limit U.S. citizenship to only those children born in the United States who have one parent who is a legal resident, member of the military, or a U.S. citizen.
The senators claim that the 14th Amendment, which grants U.S. citizenship to anyone born on U.S. soil, has led to millions of "anchor babies," the children of undocumented immigrants who are claiming U.S. residency and rights. They also claim that this will end "birth tourism."
Folks having a baby on foreign soil is not like getting a nose job in a clinic in Thailand. It happens because the immigrants are already in the United States, most probably working on farms or supporting the American economy in another way.
The ABC article notes:
Of the 4.2 million live births in the United States in 2006, the most recent data gathered by the National Center for Health Statistics, only 7,670 were children born to mothers who said they do not live here.
It is true that the United States has more liberal citizenship laws than many other countries. In Europe only the United Kingdom is comparable. But that's also why we have a vibrant economy and a high birthrate. The movement of people as well as goods creates growth and opportunity. Does crime or lawbreaking come with that -- sure it does. But it has since the beginning of time, and it's part of the process too.
If the Tea Party has its way, we'll look more like Europe without even the benefit of a safety net. An aging, diminishing population without a new base of workers and people to support it.
