Supreme Court’s rulings on birthright citizenship, campaign spending, trans athletes

On the last day of its term Tuesday, the court:

— Rejected President Trump’s executive order ending citizenship at birth for those born on U.S. soil

— Lifted limits on how much political parties can spend on advertising and other expenses in coordination with candidates

— Allowed states to bar transgender female athletes from girls’ and women’s sports teams

Birthright citizenship

In a decision by Chief Justice John Roberts, the justices agreed with the challengers, as well as all of the lower courts around the country that have considered the issue, that Trump’s order can’t be reconciled with the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which confers citizenship on anyone “born … in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” says Amy Howe of SCOTUSblog.

“The vote was 6-to-3, depending on how you count it,” says NPR. Five justices signed on to the Roberts’ majority opinion. The sixth, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, agreed only that federal legislation enacted in the 1950s grants automatic citizenship for children born in the United States.

University of Virginia law professor Amanda Frost “was surprised and saddened that the court was so closely divided,” NPR reports.

“The very length of the opinion,” she said, plus “the fact that you had four justices say the Constitution does not require near universal birthright citizenship, which had been the understanding, that suggests that this is a fringe argument that the Trump administration has succeeded in moving into the mainstream, even though it has not succeeded in the end.”

Here is more, from Heather Cox Richardson.

Campaign finance

The 6-3 decision on ideological lines “is a major victory for Republicans and could undercut one of the Democrats’ financial advantages going into the midterm elections,” says The New York Times.

“The court essentially supercharged Republicans’ almost $150 million committee fundraising cash advantage relative to Democrats, giving Republicans another large pot of money to use in what could be a challenging midterm election,” says The Washington Post.

“Under earlier rules, there were strict limits on what party committees could do for candidates. But these new guidelines are likely to upend the way committees funnel money into TV ads and campaigns,” the Post says.

The case was the latest in a series of efforts to chip away at campaign finance regulations that were enacted after Watergate to reduce the influence of money in elections. In 2010, the Supreme Court struck down limits on independent spending by corporations and unions in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. That ruling “cleared the way for a flood of new money to enter politics and set the stage for further challenges to spending limits,” the Times says.

Transgender athletes

The court’s 6-3 ruling along ideological lines deals with laws from West Virginia and Idaho but has implications for 25 other states with similar restrictions, and for athletes who compete in school and collegiate sports nationwide, the Times says.

Writing for the conservative majority, Justice Brett Kavanaugh said: “Allowing a biological male athlete to compete on a girls’ team necessarily displaces or disadvantages a female athlete — replacing her on the roster, knocking her out of the starting lineup, reducing her playing time, depriving her of a medal and the like,” he wrote. “That hard reality of sports cannot be ignored or swept under the rug.”

Kavanaugh, an avid sports fan and longtime girls’ basketball coach, concluded the opinion by emphasizing that the desire of transgender female athletes to compete “warrants respect.”

“No student-athlete on either side of the issue, whether a biological female or transgender, deserves to be ostracized or vilified” Kavanaugh wrote.

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