President Trump tore into the Supreme Court on Monday, posting on Truth Social that the nation's highest court "doesn't seem to care" after it ruled against his tariff agenda and after multiple justices signaled skepticism toward ending birthright citizenship.
The dual rebuke arrived in a single post. Trump accused the Court of "needlessly costing the USA Hundreds of Billions of Dollars in potential rebates for the benefit haters and scammers" on tariffs, then pivoted to birthright citizenship, urging the justices to watch conservative pundit Mark Levin's Fox News program for a corrective.
"It's too bad that the Supreme Court can't watch and study the Mark Levin Show tonight on the Birthright Citizenship Scam. If they saw it they would never allow that money making HOAX to continue."
He closed by urging the justices to "USE THEIR POWERS OF COMMON SENSE FOR THE GOOD OF OUR COUNTRY."
Last year, Trump issued an executive order attempting to block the children of illegal immigrants and temporary visitors from obtaining birthright citizenship. His administration argued that the 14th Amendment only applies to the offspring of a United States citizen or a lawful permanent resident, The Hill reported.
The Supreme Court heard arguments over Trump's order last week, and the session did not inspire confidence among supporters of the executive action. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson asked if mothers would be asked to produce documentation at the hospital. Justice Neil Gorsuch asked how Native Americans would be categorized under the order. Solicitor General D. John Sauer initially sounded unsure of the guidance on that latter issue.
These are the kinds of questions that treat a straightforward constitutional argument as an administrative puzzle. The underlying legal question is simple: Did the authors of the 14th Amendment intend to grant automatic citizenship to the children of people who had no legal right to be in the country? The fact that justices spent their time on hospital logistics rather than original meaning tells you where their instincts lie.
Mark Levin, who hosts a radio show and a weekly program on Fox News, laid out the originalist case on Sunday. His point was direct: birthright citizenship appears nowhere in the Constitution's text as commonly understood today, and the 14th Amendment's framers could not have intended it to cover illegal immigrants for a simple reason.
"I've looked at the invisible ink. I can't find it. Birthright citizenship. And yet, last week, there was a big argument in front of the Supreme Court and the justices, a couple of them were really wise, but most of them were like, kind of strange, getting into policy and politics and quirky examples and things of that sort."
Levin's historical argument cuts to the core: there were no restrictions on immigration in 1868 when the amendment was ratified. If there were no such thing as an illegal immigrant, the amendment's authors could not have been contemplating the citizenship status of their children. The category simply did not exist.
That hasn't stopped 125 years of interpretation from treating the 14th Amendment as a blanket grant of citizenship to all persons born on American soil. But longevity is not the same as correctness. The Court has overturned long-standing precedent before when the original text demanded it.
Levin reserved particular sharpness for the justices themselves, and Trump clearly agreed with his assessment:
"Sometimes lawyers, particularly lawyers in black robes who think they're really smart, they get carried away with themselves."
This captures something real. When justices start asking about hospital documentation protocols rather than grappling with what "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" meant in 1868, they have left constitutional interpretation and entered policymaking. That is not their job. Their job is to read the text, understand its original public meaning, and apply it.
The pattern is familiar. On questions where the left's preferred outcome is at stake, the Court's liberal wing suddenly discovers a thicket of practical complications that make constitutional fidelity seem impossible. On questions where progressive goals require creative reading, the same justices find the text remarkably flexible.
Trump's frustration with the Court extends beyond birthright citizenship. His post blasted the justices for ruling against his tariff authority, accusing them of costing the country hundreds of billions of dollars. The details of that ruling remain sparse, but Trump's message was unmistakable: the Court is standing in the way of an elected president's economic agenda.
Trump framed both issues together deliberately. He sees a Court that is comfortable overriding executive authority on trade and reluctant to revisit a constitutional interpretation that rewards illegal entry with the most valuable asset on earth: American citizenship.
"They failed miserably on Tariffs, needlessly costing the USA Hundreds of Billions of Dollars in potential rebates for the benefit haters and scammers. Why??? Don't do it again!"
The "Don't do it again" is aimed squarely at the birthright citizenship case. Trump is telling the Court, in public and in plain language, that he expects a different outcome.
The birthright citizenship case now sits with the justices. Based on last week's oral arguments, the signals are not encouraging for the administration. But oral arguments are not rulings, and justices have surprised observers before.
What Trump has done is reframe the debate in terms the public understands. Forget the legal jargon. The question is whether being born on American soil to parents who broke the law to get here automatically confers citizenship. Most Americans, when the question is put that plainly, have a clear answer.
The Constitution belongs to the people, not to lawyers in black robes who think they're really smart. Whether the Court remembers that will determine a great deal more than one case.
