President-elect Trump wants to end birthright citizenship in US; NU professor says it'll be tough

CHICAGO (WLS) -- President-elect Donald Trump wants to end birthright citizenship in the U.S.

Trump's team is working on an executive order to limit automatic citizenship for people born in the U.S.

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Chicago is a melting pot of nationalities. People hail from Mexico, Poland, Ukraine, Canada and, in the early days, Germany and Ireland.

The Constitution grants citizenship to anyone born on U.S. soil, regardless of their parents' legal status, and where they come from.

"Do you know, if somebody sets a foot, just a foot, you don't need be on your land, congratulations, you are now a citizen. Yes, we are going to end that because it is ridiculous," Trump said.

In an interview with NBC's "Meet the Press," Trump said he will end birthright citizenship, a right protected under the 14th Amendment.

"These are the people that have been the workforce to our housing industry, to our legislative industry, to the hospitality industry that has made him a billionaire," said U.S. Rep Delia Ramirez, a Democrat for the 3rd District.

Ramirez said Trump is talking about people like her.

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"I was born here in Chicago at Cook County Hospital, and the idea that someone like me, because my parents were undocumented, would lose citizenship, to me, is like the most cruel," Ramirez said.

Trump said he would issue an executive order.

"Can you do this by executive order? No, not legally, no, there is not really any sensible debate about this," said professor Paul Gowder, from Northwestern University's Pritzker School of Law.

The idea is laughable to Gowder because he said the 14th Amendment is one of the clearest provisions in the Constitution.

"This is something where there is clear legal tradition older than the U.S.," Gowder said.

Birthright citizenship was settled at the end of the Civil War.

Overturning an amendment is very difficult. It takes the House, Senate and state legislatures.

If Trump were to order U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to deport immigrants lacking permanent legal status with their U.S.-born children, it is likely the deportations will be challenged in court.

"This law is so clear that it seems unlikely to me that the Supreme Court would even rule on it," Gowder said.

Despite his harsh tone on birthright citizenship, Trump took a softer stance on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, saying he would work with Democrats to allow people who came to the U.S. as children stay in the U.S.