Made in America: Myths & Facts about Birthright Citizenship & Citizenship by the Numbers

Today, in time for Citizenship Day, the Immigration Policy Center releases a series of Perspectives on birthright citizenship, entitled Made in America, Myths & Facts about Birthright Citizenship; and a fact check documenting the growing numbers of U.S. citizens who are immigrants to this country, entitled Citizenship by the Numbers.

Made in America, Myths & Facts about Birthright Citizenship includes: Defining “American” Birthright Citizenship and the Original Understanding of the 14th Amendment, by James C. Ho; Policy Arguments in Favor of Retaining America’s Birthright Citizenship Law, by Margaret D. Stock; Debunking Modern Arguments Against Birthright Citizenship, by Elizabeth B. Wydra; and A New Nativism: Anti-Immigration Politics and the Fourteenth Amendment, by Eric Ward.

Citizenship by the Numbers is a fact check documenting the growing number of U.S. citizens who are immigrants to this country – or who are the children of immigrants. Roughly one-in-seventeen U.S. citizens are foreign-born, and tens of millions of native-born U.S. citizens have immigrant parents. This demographic reality has important political ramifications. A rising share of the U.S. electorate has a direct personal connection to the immigrant experience, and is unlikely to be favorably swayed by politicians who employ anti-immigrant rhetoric to mobilize supporters.

Highlights of this data include:

• There were 38.1 million immigrants living in the United States as of 2007, of whom 42.5% were naturalized U.S. citizens.
• The number of naturalized U.S. citizens increased from 8 million in 1990, to 12.5 million in 2000, to 16.2 million in 2007.
• There were 45.5 million Latinos in the United States in 2007, of whom 11.2% were naturalized U.S. citizens and 60.2% were native-born U.S. citizens.
• There were 13.3 million Asians living in the United States as of 2007, of whom 37.7 % were naturalized U.S. citizens and 31.8% were native-born U.S. citizens.

View Made in America, Myths & Facts about Birthright Citizenship here.

Listen to a recording of our telephonic briefing on Birthright Citizenship here.

View Citizenship by the Numbers here.

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For more information contact Wendy Sefsaf at 202-507-7524 or wsefsaf@ailf.org

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