President Donald Trump signed a flurry of executive orders covering issues ranging from immigration and trade to DEI, climate, and the federal workforce during his first week in office. Included was an executive order ending birthright citizenship—an issue Trump promised to address throughout his campaign.
That prompted some social media users to claim that Vice President J.D. Vance’s wife, Usha, would lose her American citizenship. “BREAKING – Vice President JD Vance’s wife will have her citizenship revoked if Trump signs his executive order banning birthright citizenship,” read one Threads post with more than 14,000 likes. “Neither of her parents were US citizens at the time of her birth.”
The claim is false. Trump’s executive order would only apply to individuals born in the United States after February 19, 2025, meaning no current U.S. citizens would lose their citizenship. The order also was quickly blocked by a federal judge and legal experts have said that the order is unlikely to be deemed constitutional.
Trump issued the executive order—titled “Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship” shortly after being sworn in as the 47th president. The order declares that children born in the United States would not be given citizenship if their parents were in the country either illegally or legally but on a temporary basis. However, the order also noted that the policy would apply “only to persons who are born within the United States after 30 days from the date of this order,” meaning no existing U.S. citizens would see their citizen status revoked.
A federal judge temporarily blocked the order three days later, calling it “blatantly unconstitutional” and asking, “Where were the lawyers when this decision was being made?” Traditionally, Section 1 of the 14th Amendment—which states that “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside”—has been interpreted to mean that any person born in the United States—with some limited exceptions—is considered a U.S. citizen regardless of the citizenship of their parents. The case is likely to eventually reach the U.S. Supreme Court.
Usha Vance was born in San Diego in 1986 to Indian immigrant parents who had moved to the U.S. in the late 1970s to pursue advanced degrees at California universities. It is unclear what either parent’s citizenship status was at the time of their daughter’s birth. Both now work as professors in San Diego.
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