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[numble]

I always thought doctors advised against pregnant travel in later terms.

You can usually get a visa valid for a 6-month maximum stay for each visit.

 

[SeanR1221]

That's the only problem I have with it. I'm not really against people having their babies in the US to get them citizenship, but they need to pay the medical expenses and when they're going back to another country right after I'm sure that's a big problem.

Yeah and there's really nothing the hospital can do about it.

Edit: and quite a few people have bragged to my wife that this is what their plan is. :/

 

[Eighty Deuce]

We should go full starship troopers. Can't have a baby or vote until you serve in the military.

 

[onken]

Yeah and there's really nothing the hospital can do about it.

Edit: and quite a few people have bragged to my wife that this is what their plan is. :/

Oh no the poor medical industry, however will they survive.

 

[Eidan]

As others have said, jumping straight to the 14th Amendment instead of first looking at visas, seems like a gross overreaction.

 

[SeanR1221]

Oh no the poor medical industry, however will they survive.

By raising prices for people who actually pay for insurance? I'm not sure what you were trying to imply with your post, unless you agree people should be allowed to skip out on a very hefty medical bill.

 

[onken]

By raising prices for people who actually pay for insurance? I'm not sure what you were trying to imply with your post, unless you agree people should be allowed to skip out on a very hefty medical bill.

The medical industry is not hurting for money. And since you bring it up, no I don't think people should be billed tens of thousands of dollars just to give birth safely or have life saving operations.

e- by the way, that bill is designed to be covered by insurance so is massively inflated, but I'm sure you knew that.

 

[enanogrande]

In a hypothetical USA where Visas aren't needed to enter the country and residency is automatically and immediatly granted to anyone who wants it, I would have no problem with Jus Soli being abolished.

That USA will remain hypothetical for the foreseeable future.

 

[Darren870]

I think if there going to get US citizen ship though exploiting the system then they should have to follow all the rules.

That includes paying tax on their world wide income. All the money they make in China when they are older should also be taxed by the US. Since those are the rules for other US citizens.

 

[Darkangel]

I don't think they should.

I also think the fourteenth amendment should be changed.

 

[SeanR1221]

The medical industry is not hurting for money. And since you bring it up, no I don't think people should be billed tens of thousands of dollars just to give birth safely or have life saving operations.

e- by the way, that bill is designed to be covered by insurance so is massively inflated, but I'm sure you knew that.

Who said the medical industry is hurting for money.

But you and I will pick up the slack. You know insurance premiums go up every year, right? If you're cool with that, that's on you. I'm not though.

There's also a lot that goes into birthing a baby safetly at a hospital. It's inflated but it's still a very expensive procedure.

 

[Aylinato]

Born in America, you are American. They probably would try to un-American certain demographics because our nation is rather racist at present time.

 

[King Gilga]

Because America does it, the entire world should?

Well, it doesn't work like that in most of the world.

Just because they don't doesn't mean they shouldn't.

 

[old]

No. We should repeal jus soli.

 

[poppabk]

I'm heartened to see so much love for the Fourteenth Amendment and jus soli in this thread. They're foundational elements of American democracy and shouldn't be messed with, especially not over something as trivial (if kinda grating) as this.

How can you have love for the 14th ammendment, and at the same time not want to stop an act that undermines the principal it stands for?

 

[soleil]

If someone is born in the United States and they don't get American citizenship, then they run the risk of not being a citizen anywhere, because whatever country their parents came from might not grant them citizenship (depending on the country). No system is perfect but the "You're a citizen of whatever country you're born in" is the best system we have. Children of diplomats are exempt because typically, their parents' home country has laws that will grant them citizenship.

 

[DS-61-5]

I don't think they should.

I also think the fourteenth amendment should be changed.

Doesn't need to be, just interpreted as the term was meant at the time.

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

That was a legal term of art replacing the "not subject to any foreign power” language from the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which the 14th Amendment was designed to write into the Constitution. Chief Justice Fuller's dissenting opinion in Wong Kim Ark (1898) makes a very good case explaining 1: that was what the framers of the 14th amendment were doing and 2: why America moved away from an immutable subject of the monarch based understanding to a popular sovereign/social compact/citizen version of jus sanguinis, as is practiced in every developed country except the US and Canada.

Ever wonder what the War of 1812 was about? The authority to impress sailors from American vessels, yes, but why was that a disagreement? It's because the U.S. believed allegiance derived from creedal citizenship, with the right of a sovereign community to add and exclude membership, while the Brits thought subjecthood perpetual based on where you were born--you owed, and were owed--the protection of the crown, whether you liked him or not. The oddity of diplomats' children not being covered also seems a lot less curious if you adopt this understanding.

The congressional judiciary committees occasionally flirt with bills which change citizenship laws to match this originalist understanding of the Constitution (until he became Dem Senate majority leader, Harry Reid was one of the chief supporters of this). Even some of the architects of "comprehensive immigration reform" try to use that window as an opportunity to rectify this.

TLR The most accurate reading of the 14th Amendment would block birthright citizenship from children born to both "birth tourists" and illegal immigrants.
TLR 2: YUROP is closer to the American Constitution's definition of citizenship than 'Murica.

 

[ATF487]

Very few net immigration countries have unrestricted Jus soli...most nations now have residency/parental citizenship requirements as well. I don't see the US actually passing a constitutional amendment to change this, but I wouldn't be opposed to one.

 

[You Are Viewtiful]

Very few net immigration countries have unrestricted Jus soli...most nations now have residency/parental citizenship requirements as well. I don't see the US actually passing a constitutional amendment to change this, but I wouldn't be opposed to one.

Why are you so concerned about what other countries do? Are these countries you're talking about more successful at integrating immigrants? If you were an exceptionally qualified person from a third world country, would you choose to immigrate to those countries over the USA/Canada?

 

[Valhelm]

No. We should repeal jus soli.

Why? You would honestly not allow people who live their entire lives in the United States to be citizens, just because their parents were foreigners?

 

[Duxxy3]

You're a citizen of where you're born imo.

 

[dinazimmerman]

Who is this harming?

Or is this just xenophobia?

 

[Aylinato]

Who is this harming?

Or is this just xenophobia?

Xenophobia+racism, I doubt you'd hear this many complaints if the people were polish/English/German.

 

[poppabk]

Why? You would honestly not allow people who live their entire lives in the United States to be citizens, just because their parents were foreigners?

This is the opposite of what we are discussing. Someone who came to the US as a two month old and who lives their entire life in the country could not be a citizen, not even a permenant resident, while someone who spent 2 weeks in the US as a newborn baby gets full citizenship rights in perpetuity.

 

[Thorakai]

...that awkward feeling when some people in the thread are suggesting for a change that would have left me without a citizenship.

 

[Mobius 1]

Tough question.

If the answer is "no", we can be labeled as xenophobic.
If the answer is "yes", I can see it being exploited.

 

[dinazimmerman]

This is the opposite of what we are discussing. Someone who came to the US as a two month old and who lives their entire life in the country could not be a citizen, not even a permenant resident, while someone who spent 2 weeks in the US as a newborn baby gets full citizenship rights in perpetuity.

The former being an injustice does not make the latter an injustice.

Tough question.

If the answer is "no", we can be labeled as xenophobic.
If the answer is "yes", I can see it being exploited.

Exploited? To whose detriment?

 

[DrForester]

No. I think he birthright clause needs to be amended to only allow instant citizenship if one parent is a citizen.

 

[uncredited male]

TBH, I do wonder how this would be received if it was primarily Canadians doing it.

 

[dinazimmerman]

No. I think he birthright clause needs to be amended to only allow instant citizenship if one parent is a citizen.

Why?

 

[soleil]

No one's established that any of this is even a problem.

 

[onken]

Who said the medical industry is hurting for money.

But you and I will pick up the slack. You know insurance premiums go up every year, right? If you're cool with that, that's on you. I'm not though.

There's also a lot that goes into birthing a baby safetly at a hospital. It's inflated but it's still a very expensive procedure.

Yes if my insurance premiums going up a couple of dollars a year meant a bunch of people from impoverished backgrounds could give birth safely, that is a price I would gladly pay. Sadly, we both know that the insurance companies could make record profits with every single person paying their way and still the premiums will go up.

 

[Armaros]

...that awkward feeling when some people in the thread are suggesting for a change that would have left me without a citizenship.

They aren't against you, just people like you /s

(I am one of them as well that would be without a citIzenship)

 

[The Faceless Master]

as a person that got my citizenship after a bunch of paperwork etc, all i can say is good for them. this is America. not some other country that will just toss out natural born children as unwanted.

 

[Htown]

still waiting for that downside

 

[poppabk]

The former being an injustice does not make the latter an injustice.

It's not about it being an injustice, it's that the two problems are not the same and automatic citizenship for people born in the country doesn't fix the issue of someone who spent all but 3 weeks of their life in the country.

 

[numble]

It's not about it being an injustice, it's that the two problems are not the same and automatic citizenship for people born in the country doesn't fix the issue of someone who spent all but 3 weeks of their life in the country.

So fix the other issue, not deny the 14th Amendment rights to people who will owe a ton of taxes to the U.S. by reason of birth. Since they live abroad, they are also subject to FATCA and FBAR rules, which means giving up half of their foreign accounts to the U.S. if they don't submit reports on their foreign bank assets every single year.

 

[poppabk]

I don't know why the U.S. would see it as a problem when the government has worldwide taxation. These rich babies end up either consistently paying a lot of taxes to the IRS, avoid complying with their tax obligations and get subjected to a lot more in fines or penalties, or end up expatriating to escape the punitive tax system the IRS has for Americans abroad.

You really think that if they earned $200k in China but only reported $100k to the US, that the IRS would ever know?

 

[numble]

You really think that if they earned $200k in China but only reported $100k to the US, that the IRS would ever know?

http://blogs.wsj.com/hong-kong/2011/05/11/what-to-know-about-the-irs-in-asia/

Yes, due to FATCA, and the IRS has a presence in Beijing.

Fatca applies to any bank anywhere in the world and basically says if a bank wants to invest in any U.S. asset, it has to promise to provide the IRS with every American account holder. If a bank doesn’t comply, the IRS could withhold 30% on all income and gross proceeds from a U.S. portfolio.

A lot of assets appear to be moving to Asian financial centers. The IRS knows this and has established a presence in Beijing and Sydney. They’ve sent agents over to Hong Kong in connection to particular cases.

http://www.hngn.com/articles/57420/...d-by-irs-looking-for-american-tax-evaders.htm

IRS officials are now stationed in overseas Asian jurisdictions, including at the American consulate in Hong Kong, so they can gather more information on the tax evasion network, according to Travis Benjamin, the head of tax practice at law firm Deacons.

"We're seeing greater activity of foreign tax authorities, not only those of the US, in investigations and information gathering in jurisdictions across Asia, including Hong Kong and Singapore," Benjamin told the Morning Post.

Since the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (Fatca) took effect last July, U.S. authorities have ramped up their efforts to track down American tax cheats living abroad in cities like Hong Kong, said Peter Chen, a partner at Chinese firm Zhong Lun.

The banks know that their peers like HSBC have been fined heavily in the past and are under investigation for tax evasion schemes provided to their clients. FATCA basically threatens to take away 30% of their US investments if they've found to help an American evade taxes by not reporting their accounts to the IRS.

Personally, I've been involved in a case involving one of the largest Chinese banks where they've been spending millions of dollars (probably well over $100 million by now) in attorney fees because they've been accused of being lax with their compliance to American financial regulations like FATCA.

 

[DrSlek]

Just change the citizenship laws to incorporate Jus Sanguinis

 

[ConfusingJazz]

Just change the citizenship laws to incorporate Jus Sanguinis

We have both.

 

[norm9]

still waiting for that downside

It makes my citizenship less citizeny.

 

[Blargonaut]

There's mulitple problems with this mentality.

1) "Game the system and exploit our laws to their benefit". This is one of the very few ways to get into the country legally. Here's the other few ways:



So when you're trying to come into a country that is essentially doing everything in its power to keep you out, you find a way if this is the only chance of having a better life. You make it sound like the immigrants doing this are gonna veg out on their couch and collect endlessly large welfare checks cause their kid is a natural born citizen.

2) The idea of forcibly separating children from their parents because you want to have the satisfaction that your kingdom is locked further down is really appalling. That is absolutely no way to humanely close a loophole such as this.

The amount of people who have the ability to get into the country legally long enough just at the right time for a birth to happen is actually not that high. Some people in this thread are really overselling the effect this has on the US. It's really quite minimal in reality.

Nobody. But many people have a bizarre satisfaction in clamping down on regulations that benefit a handful who are more impoverished than they are. See also: hatred toward welfare laws, food stamps.

It took me a total of 14 years to do the entire citizenship process legally from start to finish. Many immigrants of my kind instantly adopt a hateful "fuck you got mine" or "it was hard for me so it MUST be for you!" mentality, which I find absolutely bizarre. It's like rather than developing sympathy for immigrants of their kind and wishing to have a better process, they shut down and adopt an attitude to make themselves feel better about having something others don't.

Those who didn't even have to go through any citizenship process their entire lives have even less room to talk, IMO.

As an immigrant who has been embroiled in the immigration process for my entire life, I fully agree.

 

[numble]

You really think that if they earned $200k in China but only reported $100k to the US, that the IRS would ever know?

To add to the discussion regarding FATCA. FATCA is less than a year old and is a way to fine banks for not reporting the assets of Americans. So you will either get them through actual reporting or by fining Chinese banks, which they might well do in the future:

Last month, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that HSBC and Hong Kong were suspected to be involved in an international tax evasion ring. The department required HSBC's American division to provide information on U.S. tax evaders who were thought to be using offshore service providers to hide assets overseas.

Banks in Hong Kong and Panama were suspected of working together in the scheme as well.

The DOJ also accused Germany's Deutsche Bank of creating a tax evasion scheme in 1999 to avoid upwards of $100 million in federal taxes, reported The International Business Times. Israel's second largest bank, Leumi, was recently discovered to be helping Americans evade taxes, and agreed to pay $400 million in compensation.

These fines are probably far more than the taxes that Americans abroad actually owe. If you really are afraid of not being able to collect the taxes, you can place a tax compliance/audit requirement for the renewal of passports.

 

[SeanR1221]

Yes if my insurance premiums going up a couple of dollars a year meant a bunch of people from impoverished backgrounds could give birth safely, that is a price I would gladly pay. Sadly, we both know that the insurance companies could make record profits with every single person paying their way and still the premiums will go up.

Insurance premiums go up a lot more than a couple dollars a month each year. How about the give birth safety and work at a payment plan with the hospital?

Would you willingly travel to a foreign country and pull a scam to get services for free at the cost to others?

 

[Chairmanchuck]

Would you willingly travel to a foreign country and pull a scam to get services for free at the cost to others?

A lot of people in Europe are doing that sadly thanks to european immigration laws (EU-countries)...

 

[Jacob]

How can you have love for the 14th ammendment, and at the same time not want to stop an act that undermines the principal it stands for?

You're going to have to explain to me what part of the Fourteenth Amendment is undermined by birth tourism.

Edit: I'm fine with tweaking visa rules in response to this, but passing a constitutional amendment would be an absurd over-reaction.

 

[sandy1297]

To add to the discussion regarding FATCA. FATCA is less than a year old and is a way to fine banks for not reporting the assets of Americans. So you will either get them through actual reporting or by fining Chinese banks, which they might well do in the future:



These fines are probably far more than the taxes that Americans abroad actually owe. If you really are afraid of not being able to collect the taxes, you can place a tax compliance/audit requirement for the renewal of passports.

this is correct, that's why some foreign bank rather not entertain US person as a client. Especially if they have no business in USA. No client is worth the hassle of developing a brand new reporting system to the Fed/IRS/etc

 

[SkyOdin]

Yes, but why is following the Constitution necessarily a good idea? It was written over 200 years ago in an entirely different context. It's really unhealthy to just assume everything it says is a good idea, particularly when there's plenty of evidence to the contrary and America has an abnormally unhealthy democracy compared to a lot of other Western countries.

This is from a few pages back, but you are demonstrating a certain significant misunderstanding of what the US Constitution is. It isn't a matter of whether or not following the Constitution is a good idea or not, the US Constitution is law. Ever word of it is as legally binding as traffic laws, housing codes, or murder statutes. It is in fact, as it it states in its opening articles, the highest law of the land. Saying that we should just ignore the Constitution is akin to saying that the President would have the legal authority to disband Congress and declare himself King and Military Dictator of America.

The Constitution is the foundation of the entire present system of American law and government. That is why any law written by Congress that violates the Constitution can be annulled by the courts. Congress only has the power to pass laws because the Constitution confers that right to Congress. Of course, like any legal document, there are mechanisms to make changes to the Constitution, and it is open to some interpretation to fit differing circumstances. However, the Constitution is never something that can be just ignored.

So the real question isn't whether or not we can ignore the Constitution, but whether or not there is the political will to pass an Amendment specifically to limit who can acquire US citizenship.

 

[sangreal]

The 14th amendment wasn't written with the constitution 200 years ago anyway. It was added almost 100 years later for what is again, a damn good reason -- a reason that still exists today. The restriction of the rights of minorities; specifically black people.