America’s adversaries are wielding the country’s generous immigration policies as a weapon against the nation, says conservative pundit Peter Schweizer, whose latest book delves into birth tourism and the exploitation of citizenship.
Mexico, in particular, views its citizens surging into the U.S. as “retaking of territory” the U.S. claimed by arms or payments, Mr. Schweizer, author of “The Invisible Coup,” told The Washington Times’ “Court Watch” podcast.
“Their view is that mass migration gives them an opportunity to extend their sovereignty in the United States and they are actually doing it,” he said. “They are already subverting our sovereignty.”
Mr. Schweizer said the Supreme Court should consider the phenomenon of birth tourism — traveling to another country to give birth, which allows the child to have automatic citizenship — as it weighs President Trump’s executive order to end birthright citizenship in cases where the parents are unauthorized immigrants or temporary visitors.
He said Chinese parents, in particular, exploit automatic citizenship by having expectant mothers travel to the U.S. to give birth.
“The Chinese Communist Party is encouraging members of the CCP elite to do this — imagine that,” said Mr. Schweizer, president of the Government Accountability Institute.
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His work on the issue was part of oral arguments at the Supreme Court last month, when Solicitor D. John Sauer told the justices that as many as 1.5 million babies could have been born to Chinese citizens.
The issue is a legal gray area. There is no ban on a foreign visitor having a baby in the U.S., but consular officers can deny visas and border officers can deny admission to women they suspect are coming solely to win American citizenship for a child.
Mr. Schweizer said the Trump administration is taking the issue seriously.
“They are going after these birth tourism companies for visa fraud and people have already ended up in jail for doing this,” he said.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. suggested during oral argument last month that the motivations for women who came to the U.S. to give birth are not relevant to the constitutional issues at play in the court case.
“You do agree that has no impact on the legal analysis before us?” the chief justice said.
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Mr. Schweizer said it would be a mistake for the court not to consider it.
“Our federal government has no idea how big the problem is. The Chinese themselves say this is what the numbers are. It is, in fact, a suicide pact if we don’t factor this in,” he said.
He said another issue is surrogacy, in which foreign parents pay a U.S. person to carry a child, who is then entitled to U.S. citizenship.
Mr. Schweizer told “Court Watch” that 107 Chinese-owned surrogacy companies operate in Southern California.
He marveled that California, notorious for severe regulation, leaves that area largely untrammeled.
“It’s a little crazy,” Mr. Schweizer said.
He noted that a Chinese billionaire who owns a video game company and is close with the CCP has more than 100 children born by surrogacy.
“This is not random. This is very specific by these elites,” he said.
Mr. Schweizer said it becomes a national security issue because the children, while U.S. citizens, are often raised outside America and have no loyalties to the nation, yet can vote and collect benefits.
• Alex Swoyer can be reached at aswoyer@washingtontimes.com.
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