Arizona State Senate legislation that would disallow automatic citizenship to those born to undocumented immigrants did not have enough support in a committee meeting yesterday. Consequently, the bill’s sponsor pulled the two bills for the time building.
One of the bills attempted to define who could be considered as a legal citizen of Arizona, while the other seeks Congressional approval for states to differentiate between children of undocumented immigrants and other children when issuing state birth certificates. Two identical bills have also been filed in Arizona’s house.
These four bills are part of a larger crusade by conservative state legislators to create bills that would force a review of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution by the Supreme Court.
Several children spoke critically about the bill, including 12-year-old Heide Portugal, a natural-born citizen, who pointed out that if this bill had been in effect at the time of her birth, she would have been denied citizenship.
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