The U.S. Supreme Court started hearing arguments on President Donald Trump's executive order redefining the constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship, and observers pounced on conservative Justice Samuel Alito's apparent support for the government's arguments.
Several justices expressed skepticism toward Solicitor General D. John Sauer's arguments, and at one point Chief Justice John Roberts called his approach to the 14th Amendment's text "quirky," but Alito set up the government's attorney with a comment that allowed him to challenge the history.
"What we are dealing with here is something that was basically unknown at the time when the 14th Amendment was adopted, which was illegal immigration," Alito said, and Sauer agreed that was the case when the Reconstruction-era right was ratified, he added that "the problem of temporary visitors did exist."
Legal experts and other commentators parsed the arguments in the case, Trump v. Barbara, which the 79-year-old president briefly attended.
"Alito is arguing that foreign impressment somehow undermines our sovereignty and the Constitution," noted constitutional law professor Anthony Michael Kreis. "The Founding generation would throw rotten food at him in the streets for such a statement."
"So my naive tea-leaf reading is that this was a pretty disastrous hearing for the Trump Admin and anything worse than 7-2 would be a real shock," predicted financial analyst George Pearkes. "My personal hope is that Thomas decides to side with the majority and give Alito a full stroke, which seems less likely than 7-2 but possible. Hope endures."
"The Alito dissent is going to be unhinged (derogatory)," replied Bluesky user Cao Cao Power Hour Enthusiast.
"Alito is now bringing up Iranians," marveled The Nation's Elie Mystal. "He's basically asking about 'sleeper agents,' the conservative belief that babies of immigrants can be raised as Manchurian Americans who will somehow turn on us when they are *activated* at a later date."
"Sam Alito asking an extended hypothetical question about whether members of an Iranian sleeper cell would get U.S. citizenship is only lending further support to my theory that season [4] of '24' pickled the brains of an entire generation of Republican voters," added writer Jay Willis.
"Alito & Thomas used to take turns at being The Worst but recently Alito has just smoked him," said writer Bennie Smith.
"'Well, the framers of the constitution and the authors of the 14th Amendment had no concept of illegal immigration' maybe is a bit of a double-edged sword for the conservatives if you think about it for like 30 seconds," pointed out Bluesky user mtsw.
"Alito times out and gives a 429 error at about 25 seconds I assume," joked Bluesky user Ian Monroe.