What Does It Mean To Be A Citizen In This Country?

What does it mean to be a citizen in this country? Who gets to decide who belongs?  On August 6, the Trump administration issued two new executive orders targeting birthright citizenship, just weeks after the Supreme Court rejected its broader attempt to end birthright citizenship.  The administration is pursuing a narrower strategy, but the fight over who gets to claim citizenship continues.

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For Black communities, questions about citizenship, rights, and belonging carry generations of history.

Black people have spent generations fighting to be recognized as full participants in American democracy. We have organized for voting rights, equal protection, economic opportunity, and the ability to shape the decisions affecting our communities.

Birthright citizenship is rooted in the Fourteenth Amendment’s promise that people born in the United States are citizens. The current fight raises larger questions about our democracy:

What should the Constitution protect? Who should it serve? What kind of country do we want to build?

Those questions require political education. People need information they can use to understand how government works, who holds power, how policies affect their communities, and how they can take action.