The Supreme Court came out with some decisions Monday and Tuesday that many conservatives are celebrating, but, you know, you win some and you lose some.
As many analysts predicted, the High Court struck down President Trump’s executive order regarding birthright citizenship. This order stated that individuals born on American soil would not automatically receive citizenship if their parents were in the country illegally or temporarily. In a 5-4 decision, the court ruled that the 14th Amendment clearly stipulates that anyone born in the United States is considered a citizen.
But again, the ruling was 5-4, not 9-0 or even 6-3. So that in and of itself is a positive. Still, the ruling leaves the door open to the birthright tourism scam, where pregnant women either purposefully overstay their visas or sneak into the country illegally and have their babies.
So there’s nothing to be done after the SCOTUS decision, right?
Not so, says the DOJ. They reacted quickly, and in a department-wide memo, a top official ordered federal prosecutors to prioritize investigations and prosecutions against scammers who try to game the system:
Memorandum for DOJ Employees on Prosecution of Fraudulent Birth Tourism Schemes from Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald ?? pic.twitter.com/hoilA5o2TE
— U.S. Department of Justice (@TheJusticeDept) June 30, 2026
This is 12000 percent necessary. As the memo states, if the DOJ catches someone trying to cheat, then they’re going to be punished:
A senior Justice Department official, Colin McDonald, told employees in a memo that people who come to the United States under “false pretenses” to give birth and secure ?citizenship for their child could be criminally charged under laws barring visa fraud, money laundering, identity theft and wire fraud.
“The Department of Justice will zealously protect the sanctity of United States citizenship by investigating and prosecuting those who fraudulently exploit our immigration system,” McDonald wrote in a memo to all DOJ employees that was posted on social media.
The quick issuance of the memo indicates that it was drafted in anticipation of the Supremes overturning President Trump’s order. But then again, the department had already determined that birth tourism was a “national security threat”:
Birth tourism schemes exploit our immigration laws and often violate our criminal laws. The Department of Justice will prioritize the prosecutions of birth tourism schemes across the country. Actors seeking to exploit loopholes to obtain automatic citizenship for their children…
— U.S. Department of Justice (@TheJusticeDept) June 30, 2026
Birth tourism schemes exploit our immigration laws and often violate our criminal laws. The Department of Justice will prioritize the prosecutions of birth tourism schemes across the country. Actors seeking to exploit loopholes to obtain automatic citizenship for their children pose a national security threat and will be brought to justice.
Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon reminded everyone on Wednesday how lucrative and damaging birth tourism can be:
Now that the Supreme Court has given its blessing to birth tourism, it’s probably worth revisiting this story from 2019.
A Chinese national named Dongyuan Li ran a company called You Win USA Vacation Services that helped pregnant Chinese women travel to the U.S. to give birth so their children would get citizenship. She advertised having served more than 500 customers, charged each between $40,000 and $80,000, used 20 apartments in Irvine to house the mothers, and took in $3 million in wire transfers from China in two years.
Customers were coached to lie on their visa applications and at the U.S. consulate interview in China, claiming they’d stay only two weeks when they actually planned to stay up to three months to give birth. They were told to come early in pregnancy and were coached on how to conceal their pregnancies from customs.
You Win’s marketing pitch was that giving birth in the U.S. meant “13 years of free education,” “less pollution,” “an easier way for the whole family to immigrate to the United States,” and “priority for jobs in U.S. government, public companies, and large corporations.”
What could possibly go wrong by constitutionalizing the incentive driving these schemes?
Dongyuan Li pleaded guilty to federal charges for the scam in 2019 but was only sentenced to 10 months in prison. It’s better than nothing, of course, but that’s not enough to deter, in my opinion. Still, the fact that the DOJ is prosecuting these cases at all is a change from Open Borders Biden doing nothing but napping on a beach. Let’s go, Justice Dept.
