Bay Area County Joins Legal Battle Over Birthright Citizenship

One of the country’s biggest hubs for H-1B tech workers has jumped into the legal fray over President Donald Trump‘s executive order stripping immigrants’ children of birthright citizenship.

The order, which was temporarily blocked last week by a Seattle judge, would deny citizenship to the children of any foreign resident who is unauthorized or on a temporary legal status beginning next month. Legal experts say it contradicts the US Constitution’s Fourteenth Amendment and attempts to upend more than a century of US case law.

Santa Clara County argued in its complaint filed Jan. 30 in the US District Court for the Nothern District of California that the order has already sowed chaos and would create financial burdens from lost public benefits for children of residents. More than 750,000 residents of the Silicon Valley county are foreign-born—the highest share in California—including professionals on H-1B specialty occupation visas, others on student visas, and unauthorized immigrants. And at least 60% of children in Santa Clara have at least one foreign born parent.

The county is home to high-tech employers including Apple Inc., Intel Corp., Nvidia Corp., and Google’s Alphabet Inc.

Santa Clara County alleged that the executive order would mean substantial lost revenue for its County Health System because many newborns would no longer be covered by Medi-Cal, the state’s federally funded Medicaid program. Fear caused by the order is expected to reduce Medi-Cal enrollment and deter many patients from seeking care, it said.

“In just the first few days since the Order issued, staff already report that pregnant patients have expressed anxiety about the consequences of the Order for their babies and fear of delivering at the hospital,” according to the complaint.

Denying public benefits to newly-born immigrant children would also mean lost revenue to the county from state programs like those administering the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. Santa Clara would be forced to spend more to fill in the gaps, it said.

The complaint argued the order violates the Fourteenth Amendment, the Constitution’s separation of powers, and the Immigration and Nationality Act.

The lawsuit is at least the seventh filed so far to block the executive order. A federal district judge in the Western District of Washington issued a temporary restraining order Jan. 23, calling the executive action “blatantly unconstitutional.” Several courts are set to hold preliminary injunction hearings beginning next month.

The case is County of Santa Clara v. Trump, N.D. Cal., No. 5:25-cv-00981, complaint filed 1/30/25.