We Are A People, Not One Man

I am so relieved.

The fact that a person or family can immigrate to the US, start a family, and then give birth to a child who is automatically an American citizen has always been the backbone of who our country is. It is a joyous, generous, important part of our Constitution.

Yesterday, Birthright Citizenship was saved by the Supreme Court in a 5-4 ruling.

“Citizenship, then and now, was the right to have rights — to freely participate in our political community,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote. “The framers of the 14th Amendment extended that promise to ‘every free-born person in this land.’”

He added: “We keep that promise today.”

I love that this case is called Trump v Barbara. Trump versus an individual. While it was three families that sued the administration (with the help of the ACLU) over his efforts to end birthright citizenship, the case is named after one woman, an applicant for asylum from Honduras whose baby was due after the order was set to go into effect.

Of course all countries are comprised of individuals; I believe they are what makes a country unique. Yes, their governments do too, but not as much as the people. Over the last few days, I have been seeing heartwarming stories about the World Cup here in the US. It’s so wonderful to read and see how welcoming our towns and cities are to the foreigners, and reaffirms my faith in Americans at their heart. Yes, we have racists, misogynists, homophobes, xenophobes, grifters and con-men (whom might I be referring to?). But apparently those people are being overwhelmed by kind, generous, fun-loving Americans who are welcoming players from across the world. This makes me proud.

Trump has been uninvolved with the World Cup, which is strange. But I’m so glad he’s staying out of a joyous thing.

We are a people, not one man.

Thanks for being here, see you tomorrow! You all are the best, you keep be going.