Aerial photograph showing a hospital near the San Ysidro International Border Crossing in Tijuana, Baja California (Mexico). EFE/Joebeth Terríquez
Tijuana (Mexico), Aug 21 (EFE) – US President Donald Trump’s new offensive against so-called “birth tourism” has raised alarms on the border with Mexico, where for decades Mexican women have crossed on tourist visas to give birth in the United States, a practice that now faces increased immigration scrutiny.
The measures are part of a new attempt by Trump to restrict birthright citizenship, after the Supreme Court blocked a previous order that sought to limit that right, protected by the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
“These are two executive orders issued by President Trump on August 6 to combat ‘birth tourism’,” explained anthropologist Victor Clark Alfaro, director of the Binational Center for Human Rights in Tijuana, to EFE.
“But the precedent for these executive orders they just issued is the Supreme Court ruling that stopped what Trump intended: to eliminate birthright citizenship,” he added.
According to Clark Alfaro, the new provisions translate into greater controls at ports of entry and US consulates on pregnant foreign women seeking to legally enter the country.
“Those are the ones that will be thoroughly questioned,” the specialist stated.
A common practice on the border
The impact could be especially keen in Tijuana, a city closely linked to the neighboring state of California and where many families have members born on both sides of the border.
“Many border residents, because it is part of the cultural and social phenomenon of the border, many border residents with tourist visas, their wives crossed so that their son or daughter could be born there and then they returned,” Clark Alfaro explained.
The anthropologist warned that the measures could affect parents whose children were previously born in the United States after entering on tourist visas.
“For several days now they have been starting to cancel visas, B1/B2 visas for parents whose children were born in the United States,” he said.
The United States, however, had already been restricting so-called “birth tourism” since Trump’s first term. In January 2020, the State Department amended its rules to allow consulates to deny visitor visas when they believe the primary purpose of the trip is to give birth in order to obtain U.S. citizenship for the baby.
US rules, on the other hand, allow entry with a visitor visa to receive medical treatment, so pregnancy itself does not constitute a prohibition on entering the country.
Fear of potential health risks
The president of the Baja Health Cluster in Tijuana, Jesús Fabián R. Walters Arballo, expressed his concern about possible health consequences of the tightening of border controls.
“What we don’t want is for there to be a health problem or for them to be put at risk for that reason,” he stated.
The doctor noted that a woman with a very advanced pregnancy could raise greater suspicions about the purpose of her trip.
“If a patient who is nine months pregnant tries to cross into the United States, it’s very clear that she’s going there to give birth. There will probably be a restriction by CBP,” he said.
Washington’s offensive also includes actions against the networks that facilitate these trips. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the creation of a task force to investigate so-called birth tourism and asserted that in its first month, authorities revoked more than 600 visas of foreigners suspected of participating in these schemes.
There are no official figures on how many foreign women travel to the United States each year specifically to give birth. The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), an organization that supports reducing immigration, estimated in 2020 that between 20,000 and 25,000 women did so during a one-year period between 2016 and 2017.
As Trump’s new offensive moves forward, birthright citizenship remains constitutionally protected for virtually everyone born on U.S. soil, but in border cities like Tijuana, uncertainty is growing about the consequences that the new controls may have for binational families.
